The Technobabble Solution
by JohnnyStyle
Summary: Long after the events of Life is Strange Max's long dormant time travel powers react to something she is exposed to. But does the shock wave reach through the fourth dimension as well? Rated MA for Mature themes, Coarse language, sexual references, drug use and references and over indulging in Breakfast foods, waffles in particular.
1. Prologue

**Prologue- How the Two Whales' Diner got its Name**

The Past- When Pirates first roamed Arcadia Bay

Two little girls sat side by side in the booth just one down from the Jukebox devouring sugar laden treats. One had waffles and the other pancakes but like any good Captain and first mate they shared their bounties. So it was more half waffle and half pancakes for the both of them. Their favourite member of the staff came over and offered to refresh their drinks.

"Thanks mom," said the young Chloe Price.

"Thanks Mrs Price," said the young Max Caulfield.

"Oh Honey you've known me long enough that you can just call me Joyce," she said. "You have my permission to do that Maxine."

"Its Max. not Maxine," Chloe said indignantly. "You know she hates been called Maxine."

"My apologise Max," Joyce said to her daughter's best friend.

"I accept your apology Mrs...Joyce," The girl said. "Can I ask you something? I've been wondering about it for awhile now."

"No you can't permanently move into Chloe's room."

"Nice try my loyal first mate."

"No I was just wondering why the Diner is called what it is," Max explained. "Why not just the whale or maybe the whale pod?"

"That is a bit before my time here darling," Joyce said as she slid behind the counter to pour a coffee for one of the regulars. "Here Stan you were around when they changed the name weren't you? Why two whales?"

"I can do our little pirates one better," Stan said cheerfully. "I saw it all, the reason they changed the name."

"Is it a Pirate story?" Chloe asked enthusiastically.

"You bet it is captain," He said. "But hold your first mate close because I will admit to you that I was a bad and evil pirate back then and I did a most despicable thing. I hunted whales."

"That's horrible," Max said burying her head into Chloe.

"Aye it was but this is a story about the day I stopped hunting those magnificent creatures."

"Go on," Chloe said not sure whether she should see Stan in a new light or not.

"We'd set to sea that day hoping we'd pull in a least one beast," he continued the tale. "We thought we had been lucky to spot two travelling together. We set the harpoon and our gunner took aim, he lined up the shot and squeezed the trigger."

"This is horrible," Max said mainly to herself.

"But there was a thunk when there should not have been one. The harpoon stopped in mid air and dropped harmlessly into the water. Needless to say we were surprised, but we where even more surprised when the air shimmered and a strange craft revealed itself like a giant green bird made of metal. It just hovered there above us slowly turning. It was then that one of our lookouts noticed the Whales disappeared in a haze of light, probably some of the sea water surrounding them to."

"No way," Chloe said.

"That can't be true," Max stated.

"We got out of there as fast as we could," Stan finished of the story. "When we got back here and recounted the tale we were of course not believed and accused of been drunks and liars, we said Two Whales so much I think the owner began to like the sound of it and decided to change the Diner's name. Needless to say our crew split up, most went to find jobs inland, although our captain took it as a cue to retire. I'm the only one who sails any more, decided to become a good pirate, not as heroic as yourselves of course, but I joined Greenpeace and helped protect the whales. I figured if aliens came here just to save them they must be pretty damn important."

"So it was all true then," Max decided.

"That's quite a tale," Joyce said as she freshened up Stan's coffee.

"Thank you Sir for that grand tale," Chloe said with a bow. "Sadly I can give you no coin for the telling as my gold is buried all over, but I know the staff of this fine establishment, perhaps they can give you a slice of bacon in lieu of payment. Now if you excuse me my crew must be off."

She grabbed Max and rushed out the door.

"Chloe get back here," Joyce called. "You can't just tell some one I'll give them bacon."

"Its fine Joyce," Stan said frowning slightly. "Shoot I forgot to tell them the best part, I think the aliens were pirates to."

Outside the pirates planned their day.

"Where will we sail today Captain Chloe?" Max asked.

Chloe pulled off her pirate hat and placed it on her friends head.

"That's up to you Captain Max."

"Then to the lighthouse," Max said. "We've been approached by the Galaxy Council to help them protect their newest members, the Humpback Whales of earth, from those that would hunt them down."

"But what's in it for us?"

"Ah first mate, a chest full of space doubloons and our own planet of nothing but tropical Islands."

"I vote we name the planet Maxima for the best captain there ever was."

And the Pirates of Arcadia Bay were off on another grand adventure.

No when, a Friday: The week that never was

Chloe had no doubt that this was all real. All that remained now was to see if she ceased to exist or if she would continue existing as per other theories of time travel. If it was the latter at least she knew Max, her wonderful, loving, awkward heroic hipster Max would be safe. And she was sure that after that wonderful kiss Max would know that this all happened and that Chloe loves her. Chloe just hoped that some of the her that was ending right here would integrate with the her that died in the girls restroom on Monday and know that Max Caulfield loved her so much she wouldn't invalidate the sacrifice she was making so that the other residents of Arcadia Bay could have a chance to be as happy and in love as she felt right now. Max began focusing on the photo of the butterfly Chloe had kept safe all week. Now all Chloe Price had to do was wait and see.

1 of May 2053: The Pirate vs. The Nuclear Apocalypse

The old lady climbed towards the bench near the lighthouse with some urgency. She was only in her late fifties which thanks to advances in Medical science was more like the mid forties of times gone by, but she had spent the last two weeks digging and that had taken its toll.

"Who is the crazy old lady now?" Max said to no one she stopped for a moment as if listening to a reply that never came.

"I'm almost there Chloe," she said as she sat. "Can't believe I dug out that place, but you would have, despite what he caused to happen to Rachel, to you and so many others. Because it was the right thing to do and now fifty more people have the chance to survive what's coming."

She pulled out her camera and took one last selfie, she'd been saving the last piece of film stock for five long years waiting for just such a special occasion. Having sore hands she didn't even bother flapping the photo around as she usually did. She had to laugh when she realised she was still wearing her Pirate hat when she saw it in the photo. She'd worn it to convince the children to help her look for buried treasure. The adults had just laughed at crazy old lady Max, that was until they realised that the buried treasure was the missing Prescott bunker. They to knew its dark history and it's other name but in this day and age any and all underground refuges would be used.

Max dropped the selfie to the ground and looked up. It was such a clear day for the end of the world. She had always assumed it would be a stormy and dark, just like when Chloe...when Chloe...Max cried. The nuclear bomb dropped almost unnoticed just the other side of the lighthouse. And Max's last thought was as always of a beautiful woman with blue hair and the kiss they shared right on that spot just over there.

The Present: Not quite Utopia but getting there

The children crowded around the woman that had appeared out of thin air and interrupted their playtime.

"Maybe she's the ghost," one suggested.

"That would be highly illogical," replied his female friend with the pointed ears.

"Why?" their other friend sneered. "Did your Dad say the Science academy decided ghosts were not real?"

"Lay off her Van," the first child said. "Its not T'ler's fault the Vulcan science academy couldn't bring itself to ask What if? for the first few years of the federation's existence."

"That's not it and you know it David."

"I merely meant that this woman cannot be the ghost," T'ler explained. "In all stories related to the Ghost of Arcadia Bay she has blue hair, this woman does not, therefore logically she cannot be the ghost."

"Chloe?" the woman on the ground said.

"Excuse me," David said. "Is that your name?"

"No I'm Max," the woman murmured. "If you see Chloe send her over, I've been waiting a few decades to kiss her again."

What conciousness the woman had been holding onto slipped away.

"I knew we should have bought a comm unit," Van wailed. "We need our parent's help."

"That's no way for a deep space exploration crew member to talk," T'ler said a little too forcefully. "Here's the most logical plan, Van use your tricorder to scan this woman for injuries."

"Aye Captain," Van replied.

"David use my training lipra to ward off any wildlife that gets curious."

"But its yours."

"But you are more skilled in its use."

"Aye Captain."

"I will collect M'arshda from the bottom of the path were she was tracking that deer," T'ler explained. "Being the best long distance runner she will be able to get into town to retrieve help the quickest. I shall then retrieve a med kit from the first aid stand at the start of the trail and then return."

Immediately all three children set to their tasks.

As Van scanned the woman and David scanned the undergrowth they conversed.

"Van I know you're a Tellarite and to argue with people is your cultural right but don't you think T'ler is already upset over the whole Romulus and Remus thing."

"Then why didn't her father support..."  
"They've been going to therapy."

"Oh," Van said. "I'll, I'll try to be more supportive. This mystery might make her feel better though, she might even do the eyebrow thing."

"What Mystery?" David asked. "At the moment isn't it most likely this woman just has access to another form of transporter technology."

"How can you wait a few decades to kiss someone when you're only eighteen years old?"

Further up time: A transitional time about time

"Believe me I know it is hard Daniels," The Admiral told his student. "But you know I saw your point eventually."

"I know," Daniels replied. "Its just difficult to remember the you I met tomorrow might not be the experienced you of today."

"Don't sweat it kid," the Admiral practically laughed. "The you I know today definitely isn't the arrogant know it all who was always criticising our methods, but eventually you will be."

"I know you actually did your best I just wish it hadn't opened up more fronts in the Temporal Cold war."

"Has your organisation identified more time periods?"

"A few...but some just don't make sense," Daniels said. "Why the 22nd century, why not the 21st where humans were still confined to the one solar system, why not before the third world war even..."

The alarm klaxon sounded throughout the ship.

"Sir," called the ensign. "There are several humanoid life signs moving rapidly uptime. The Chroniton wake they're leaving...these readings don't make sense."

"Daniels I know you're a civilian but man that transporter," the admiral said. "I want the best person on this and that's you."

"Yes Admiral Ducane."

"Readings indicate some kind of chroniton surge, epicentre in the 2010s and 2050s," the ensign said. "The 2010 reading just went haywire, fluctuating between a temporal loop and a knot."

"Now its a shunt," another crew member called.

"Ignore all that," The admiral ordered. "Daniels, readings on our time traveler."

"This can't be right," Daniels said. "I'm reading roughly one hundred, all the same person just with a quantum variance of...how can you get a quantum variance that low without reality folding back into the origin timeline. Wait they're integrating down to 47, 30, 20, 15.

"Beam them all to sickbay," the Admiral ordered. "And by the great bird of the galaxy don't integrate what's left of them. The variance between these two is too great."

"Already ahead of you," Daniels said. "That one with the greatest variance, the medical scan, what kind of primitive age is this person from."

Daniels caught the admiral smiling at him as the console read that beaming was complete.

"You've meet this person in her future haven't you, but your past."

"Perhaps," Admiral Ducane. "But you actually meet her for the first time right now."

"Any advice?"  
"Just what you will tell me in the future," he said. "The twenty-first century was a strange time to be a teenager."


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: Welcome to a Strange New World**

Now: The first day of the Rest of Max's life

Clare Raymond wasn't quite used to being asked out into the field. Usually the people she counseled after they were displaced in time came to her comfortable office at the Department of Temporal investigations head quarters. Her nice neutral office with the inoffensive furniture and the alcove that hid all the modern conveniences away behind a curtain. She wondered how much being revived on the Enterprise D influenced that. Some how they were able to introduce the 20th century woman to the 24th century with out having a complete freak out, and she put that down to the decor, at least 30% of the reason.

But when Deputy director Lucksly says its a special case while becoming even greyer, you ask when and were and ask for the best chronometer so you aren't late. So here she was at Starfleet medical being ushered into a high security ward. From what little details about the time displaced person she was given she thought it excessive. All this for a teenager. But she supposed when Time Travel was involved there was no such thing as too careful.

"Counselor Raymond?" the attending Doctor asked.

"Yes that's me," she said. "But if you don't mind I usually just prefer Clare."

"Ah yes the more personal touch," he said. "If I ever update those mental health subroutines I would probably go with that option, of course I need a name first."

"I thought I recognised you," Clare said. "Is it wise to have a hologram treating her?"

"Considering I look outwardly human and the other available Physician with time travel experience is a Xindi insectoid I think I really am the best choice."

"Very well Doctor," Clare said. "What can you tell me about our Time Displaced Person."

"Very little I'm afraid," The Doctor said. "So far I've been able to ascertain that she's in the best health for and eighteen year old human but her Chroniton readings are unusual."

"How unusual?"

"I've only seen one other person with readings this close," The doctor said. "I'm sure the DTI already has my reports on file in regards to a procedure to arrest a case of backwards mental time travel."

"I'll have to look it up," Clare said grimacing. She didn't know much about the science of time travel but more Chronitons was usually bad news.

"Yes, Yes, I was told that the agents investigating the time travel itself would be sometime investigating the arrival site," The Doctor said. "As for the girl her name is Max, don't call her Maxine if the dirty look she gave me is anything to go by."

Clare pulled out her standard issue pad and started taking notes.

"I asked her what the year was and she said it was probably 2053," the Doctor continued. "But then she saw her reflection in the window and said it was actually 2013 and she was just 'playing me'."

"You didn't tell her the date yet?"

"Of course not," The Doctor said. "What I did do is start some deep scans because of the discrepancy between the years."

"Anything else?"

"I had to sedate her."

"Why the hell would you do that?"

"She started to have a sever panic attack when I said I was just The Doctor."

Clare smacked her palm to her forehead.

"Perhaps you should come up with a name anyway," Clare said. "That particular phrase might be problematic to time travelers from 2013."

"She doesn't know she is a time traveler yet."

"She's a teenager she is most likely lying to you," Clare sighed. "Can you bring her around and then monitor us from the office?"

"So we play good cop, absent cop?"

"Just a precaution," she said. "If it wasn't for those high chroniton readings you wouldn't be monitoring at all."

"Fair enough I'll make myself scarce."

Slowly Max Caulfield regained conciousness. Even more slowly she raised herself to the sitting position and groped around for her camera.

"You dummy Max, you ran out of film," She said to herself. "And you threw your digital off a cliff."

"Is it common for teenagers to talk to themselves during your home time period?" Clare asked.

"What, where?" Max said. "Sorry me not think good first bit of awake time."

"Its more of a matter of when."

"No, No, No, No."

"Freak out later," Clare said putting a calming hand on the girl. "For now listen, My name is Clare Raymond, I died in the nineteen nineties, instead of burying me my husband froze me and placed me on a space installation. A lot of stuff happened after that and the next thing I remembered, turned out my husband was right and a cure was found for my condition but by the time I was revived it was already the 24th century. I took the long way, we believe you took the fast way. No matter what happens you have to believe me, that I have one purpose only in this and that is to help you in anyway I actually can."

"No, no they can't have come back," Max said as she raised her right arm. "See they're gone Max."

"What's gone?"

"But that was probably the most danger you had ever been in," Max continue. "Since that..."

"You realise you're talking out loud."

"Gah."

"Lets try this again," Clare said. "Hello my name is Clare, what's your name?"

"Max."

"That's good, can you tell me how old you are?"

"Fifty something."  
"I find that hard to believe young lady," Clare said. "Modern medicine is good but not that good."

Max looked at her hands they looked so young.

"Can I get a mirror or something?"

"I think I can do a little better," Clare said. "Please don't be shocked, just think of it as a little taste of the future. Computer display a hologram of the patient in biobed 3 please."

The computer beeped in acknowledgement and Max was staring at a copy of herself.

"It's not exact the computer is just using the sensors in the bed to project an image, but that's more or less what you look like right now.

"Shit, why am I eighteen?"

"We'll figure it out Max," Clare said. "Now what's the last thing you remember before..."

"It finally happened, after delaying the Nuclear War for about One hundred years humanity finally decided to have that apocalypse we kept putting off. I decided to meet it in the place the meant the most to me."

"Uh uh," Clare said jotting it down. "World War Three then."

"You said fast way," Max said. "Does that mean Time Travel?"

"Yes."

"Is it...common?"

"No," Clare said. "Sure random space anomalies are a problem but considering the only reliable way is with a starship capable of a sustained warp 8, a sun and the precise mathematics that are suppressed by 15 different governments its not something people do."

"So no one can sort of just leap back themselves?"

"No one on our level of development," Clare said. "Now where's home?"

"I travel a lot for work or I did I guess," Max said. "But my heart is always in Arcadia Bay, shit hole that it can be sometimes.

"That's where you were found today," Clare said. "Right near the lighthouse. Anything else that you think might be relative to your time displacement?"

"For a brief period during October 2013 I was able to rewind time by a few minutes, I then found out I was able to mentally time travel into my younger self by staring at photographs. I no longer have the abilities for reasons I don't want to talk about."

"You'd be the first human with such an ability," Clare said calmly. "Could explain a few warnings that have been left by uptime factions on our secure computers this morning."  
"What?" Max said. "No surprise this was all a joke now you ruined it, or a ticket to the loony bin or a time to take you away for experimentation."

"All members of the Federation tend to arbour illegal experimentation," Clare said. "And why would I think you're joking about time travel when I believe that odd gesture you did earlier was seeing if you could still do it."

"You could still think I'm insane."

"We have to have at least five counseling sessions together before I can decide that."

Further up time: Truth

 _Wow Max was right I look awesome with blue hair. But why am I over there, come back here me. Look at me I'm a Mighty Morphine Power Ranger. Come back here me._

"Holy fuck my armed moved."

"Shut up and go back to sleep blondie."


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Instant Film**

Now: Replicator Appreciation day

Max snapped the picture and enjoyed the sound of her camera whirring to life. She had thought she would never been able to use it again considering she had run out of film and as far as she knew there would never been any more. She definitely would have held on to it as it was the one that had belonged to William, the one Chloe had given her, but not. She had been helping Joyce and David sort out Chloe's things a month after the funeral when they had found it. Joyce had immediately offered it to Max. There was no way Max would turn it down considering all the extra meaning it carried. Her other camera became the one she lent to any friends who wanted to go on a snapshot adventure with her.

So replicators. Definitely the future then. She hadn't ever got instant film stock quite that instantly before. Usually she had to plan weeks in advance about when to order, what shipping company to use and so on. Or stock up in vast quantities when visiting Portland or Seattle. She smiled to herself about that one time with Warren and Brooke, it was amazing Warren's overloaded car even made it back to the bay. Max frowned, all of them were gone now. All had led full lives but she hoped some of them survived to see the beginning of this better society though. Max made a note to check the history books to find out because as far as she knew they weren't sending her back, perhaps her friends and colleagues had helped start the earth that had done good.

"Good Morning Max," Clare Raymond said as she entered the ward. "I see someone's introduced you to the replicator."

"Yeah the doc did when he got sick of my complaining about the hospital gown," Max said as placed her camera and new selfie in her newly replicated bag. "Tell me I won't look out of place."

Clare took a moment to consider Max's outfit. Canvas hi-top sneakers in a muted red, the classic jeans appropriate for any time period after they'd been invented, a black T-shirt with a vibrant blue butterfly print and finally the grey unzipped hoody that topped off the outfit.

"A little out of date," Clare declared. "But people wouldn't look at you twice."

"Good that's what I was going for," Max said. "Ultimate hipster, several centuries out of date, too cool to be retro. Uh the doc gave me my camera when I asked for it but I didn't see where he grabbed it from, do you know where...?"  
"What food item did you keep asking the replicator for?" Clare asked.

"Pancakes," Max admitted. "I think I'm over it now but...I'm just not used to..."

"Croissants," Clare said. "Don't worry you'll get over it, my fellow popsicles and I did."

"Uh yeah," Max said. "Anyway my stuff?"

"In the draw next to the bed," Clare said.

Max opened it and immediately saw the pirate hat she had been wearing. She quickly pushed it aside. The clothes were her style but drabber, also the sizes seemed off. A bit bigger in the waist, shorter in the legs, the jacket seemed thicker. Max grimaced, hopefully they'd figure out why she was eighteen again.

"Where is it?" she asked herself as she pulled the clothes aside. "It has to be here."

"Are you okay Max?"

"Found it," Max said as she quickly wrapped the spiked band around her right wrist. "I feel like my selfie again."

Clare quickly scanned her padd for the list of early 21st century slang she had wisely decided to load that morning. She understood the meaning she was just checking to make sure her notes were correct.

"Lets go out to the garden," Clare said. "The rain isn't scheduled until this evening and its too much of a lovely day to stay indoors."

"This is lovely," Max said as she whipped out her camera and took a shot of a strange alien flower.

"I prefer the open gardens at Starfleet academy myself," Clare stated. "Its more of a blend of species from right across the Federation and beyond."

"Is this the bit you hit me with a big truth bomb?" Max asked.

"How so?"

"You apologise but you have to mind wipe me and send me back from whence I came."

"That would be highly unethical," Clare said. "Considering we'd be sending you straight back into the heart of a nuclear detonation. So you're here to stay."

"You mean I literally got blown forward a few centuries?" Max asked.

"Perhaps," Clare said. "It could be week, maybe months or years before we find out what happened to you."

"Heavy."

"Indeed it is Marty," Clare said with a smile. "In any case my usual job is to help you get used to living in the future and help you understand why its probably not a good idea to time travel back if the option becomes available or an opportunity presents itself. No matter how many people you think it might save."

"Been there done that," Max said coldly. "Learned my lesson. Fucked with time, lost everything."

"So my job right now is to ask you do you want to talk about it?"

"No, yes," Max said. "Can I trust you? I've talked about some of it before to friends, but it took years, heck I waited until one of them was moving to Mars permanently despite the fact I was the best man at his wedding."

"Max ever thing we talk about remains between us," Clare stated. "The only thing that can make me break that is if you do try to change the timeline. I might recommend sharing some information with others, but this will solely be related to the time travel abilities you claim to have had, in order to protect others."

"Can I lay down some ground rules?"

"Of course."

"I say it was a week but it was five days," Max said. "We don't talk about day five, I'll never be able to talk about day five I think. Second I'll jump to any day I damn well please, time travel is too confusing to keep totally straight. Three we have our sessions in places like this, I have some issues with one on one settings and comfortable chairs. Last if I want you to change the subject I will say the phrase 'shaka brah'."

"Okay," Clare said with a nod. "Is the comfortable chair thing related to day five."

"Shaka Brah," spilled immediately out of Max's mouth.

"Okay so lets build some trust here," Clare said. "Why that phrase in particular?"

"It both amuses me and is important to me," Max said. "Its special. I'll get more into it when the time comes."

"Okay," Clare said. "We can continue this tomorrow, I have to check in with the assistant director and just give them a quick update. I'll see if we've found out why you got sent forward in time like you did."

"I hope my powers aren't back," Max said. "Any advice on how to catch up on a few hundred years of lost history?"

"Go to the replicator and ask for a copy of the history of the federation: the first one hundred and fifty years," Clare said. "That was a good start, you might find the first few chapters a hard slog though seen as you lived them."

"What about art?"

Clare considered for a moment.

"Ask the Doctor," she said as she left. "He counts photography as one of his hobbies."

As Clare made her way to the facilities transporter pad she wondered if she should have warned Max about the slide shows that had gained infamy from Qo'nos to the gamma quadrant.

Further up time: Stupidity

"I volunteer."

"Are you sure?"

"Hey I was stupidly reckless enough to lie across train tracks like that, let me be stupidly reckless again."

"Hey we all were."

"I wasn't"

"You were going to be."

"I wonder if they fixed the track?"

"I already explained Max changed it."

"In my version of reality it didn't happen."

"I want to do this, I think I finally understand, it's Max, it has always been Max. You you were the last?"

"Second last but yeah I was the one at the end."

"It has to be me integrating with you, just, just in case it doesn't work. You'll still be there to know the whole story."

"Okay."

"One thing first though."

She removed her beanie and placed it on the blonde.

"That looks hella awesome on you Vanilla"

"Hate that word...also...Vanilla?"

"Would you prefer Happy?"

"Just because I had a different life experience doesn't mean I was happy. I hadn't been for a long time not until...Max."

"Come on Damsel."

"Come on dude just because I was going to die like that. No wait I can see Prescott with the mustache."

"Not Nathan...it was worse."

"Vanilla can you look after Amber, she's from the worst spot any of us could be in."

"We'll be back soon."


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: The 47 times Max abused her Rewind powers and the one time she didn't**

Now: Annoy the hell out of medical holograms day

"How do you feel about beans?" Max asked as her attending physician studied some read outs.

"That's not a name."

"No its a food," Max said. "If you like Beans then Frank is the perfect name for you, if you don't its clearly out."  
"I have no feeling about beans one way or another."

"Okay so not Frank," Max said. "Honestly I don't think you're cool enough to be an Evan, too cool to be a Warren. I know how about Pompidou?"

"That sounds like a dog's name."

"Pompidou was a very well respected resident of Arcadia Bay until he passed away in 2017."

"And how many legs did this resident have?"

"Four."

"And how many tails?"

"One."

"I highly doubt people would take me seriously if I named myself after a dog."

"Come on Pompidou was great," Max said insistently. "Reaffirmed my faith in Dog several times."

"Truly the twenty-first century became even more backwards than the twentieth."

"Hey we only had one world war thank you very much," Max complained. "Well what about last names, have you thought of any of them?"

"Actually I have one I just don't want to use it yet," the doctor said as he turned and prepared a cortical scanner.

"Why not?"

"A stubborn family matter."

"A stubborn family then?"

The Doctor seemed content to ignore the question..

"Now Max," he said. "This is going to scan your brain."

"Didn't you do that yesterday?"

"Yes but that was a standard health check up," the Doctor explained. "This is going to actively search for Chronitons and a few other things that relate to time travel."

"And Chronitons are bad?"

"Merely a particle associated with time travel," The Doctor said.

Clare Raymond came in while the Doctor was looking at the initial readings. Clare almost burst out laughing when she saw the look on Max's face who was studying the screen over the Doctor shoulder. It was as if Max's face was able to perfectly reflect the blank her mind must be drawing.

"I take it science and math aren't your strong points," Clare said startling Max slightly.

"Uh..what...uh good morning Clare," Max said. "I guess I've always been more of a student of the humanities...shit is that cultural insensitive? I mean the doc here introduced me to Doctor Xerex and he seemed like a pretty regular guy. In fact I did met stranger people in college. I hope I didn't commit some faux pas, I just don't know how to maintain eye contact with someone who has compound eyes."

"Hey its okay you'll get used to it all," Clare said. "I did, we'll discuss this at a later date though. Any way how did your discussion with the Doctor about the current state of the art scene go?"

"Quite well," Max said. "I have a few places to check out once the investigation is finished, I'm particularly looking forward to seeing some of Torah Zihyal's work up close. My first instinct is to compare it to Kate Marsh's work from her depressive periods but that would be doing both artists a disservice. Besides I knew Kate so I know that the dark works only exist to show how much better she is in what I called her story book mode."

"And did the Doctor show you any of his own work?"

"Loved the away mission selfies," Max said. "You can see how happy he is to be out in the world. Not so fond of the hyper posed group shots of his friends though."

"Not this again," the Doctor said not looking away from the screen.

"Doc the woman with the forehead deal looked like she was going to throw her kid at you," Max said. "And the kid wouldn't have complained by the looks of it."

"It took me five minutes to get that holophoto."

"That was the problem," Max said. "Let me offer you some advice, remember I may look eighteen but I have fifty plus years of experience with this medium, one work out the pose first, even for ordinary everyday mementos like that one, it will save you time and tears. Two don't get all arts-y if its not appropriate for the situation, finding the right lens, great for those microcosm in macrocosm series you showed me, not so great for a reunion. And finally know when not to take the shot. Others will say always take the shot but I can tell you that's complete bullshit."

"You use a lot of profanity," The Doctor commented.

"I've earned it kid," Max said.

"That reminds me I've had some thoughts on your age decrease," he said. "I should have some answers for that soon."

"Anything else Doctor?" Clare asked.

"No Max is free to go," the Doctor said. "This scan isn't showing anything I haven't seen already."

Clare considered for a moment.

"Max would you please do that gesture you did yesterday?" Clare asked.

"They aren't back," Max insisted.

"Nether the less it would probably be best for the doctor to get a reading of you trying to activate them," Clare said. "It could help if they do come back."

"Okay," Max said raising her right hand her focus intensely on the spiked band on her wrist. "See still gone, thank dog."

The Doctor hmm-med at an interesting spike on his display.

"Anything else doctor?" Clare asked.

"No," The Doctor said. "In fact Max will be able to stop wasting bed space tomorrow. I trust the Department of Temporal investigations can handle living arrangements."

"Of course," Clare said. "Come on Max lets go get you some real coffee."

"Coffee good, tea better."

A few short minutes later Max was sipping just a regular black coffee at a place called Velocity Coffee that seemed to be situated in between many institutions that were important in this future San Francisco. She had had every intention to have tea but it was just so confusing. So many versions from so many planets. As far as she could tell from her limited experience with the modern marvel of the replicator it did coffee okay but the real version just had, something more. She glanced at the tea menu again. She hoped that Kate had gotten a chance to try all those Vulcan blends.

"Thanks for the book recommendation," Max said to Clare. "You were right about those first few chapters though."

"So how much had been found out before the war anyway?" Clare asked. "I mean I died because of stuff most people didn't know was happening."

"We knew about the Augment Juntas in the 2030s," Max said. "About the time the Middle east sorted itself out and the rest of the world started to go to hell in a hand basket. Honestly I skipped a lot of the World War Three stuff, I was old but I still had friends around you know."

"So what bit are you up to?" Clare asked.

"The warp 5 program," Max said. "Is it wrong to say the Vulcan's were both right and wrong in their early dealings with us. Part of me thinks I've seen humanity at this best possible version we've seemed to lived up to since first contact, but the other part, she has seen humans being the very worst they can be."

Max looked down into he coffee as if it could offer her answers to deep personal troubles.

"I take it you saw both ends of the spectrum during your time travel experience?"

Max went to pick up her coffee, decided against it, then wrung her hands and then started to toy with the band around her wrist. Clare didn't need any kind of training to know it was important and related to whatever the young, well young looking anyway, woman had experienced.

"Can we talk here?" Max asked. "I mean all these people."

"Max," Clare said. "The cadets over there are currently doing their advance course in temporal mechanics, the man by the counter is one of my bosses, those tourists are actually from the Starfleet ship assigned as support to the department and this padd is currently set to dampen sound waves."

"So this conversation?"

"Is only between you and me," Clare explained. "The other patrons just hear the cadets talk about the bootstrap paradox as it related to a pair of reading glasses owned by a famous Captain or the tourists talking about their plans for the afternoon."

"Okay," Max said holding onto the band again. "Okay...so the first thing I did...when I found out I could rewind...was stop someone from getting shot. I saw it go down the first time around and as the girl with blue hair fell to the floor I held out my right hand as if I could stop it from happening. The next thing I remember was waking up back in class. But it was before. I was sitting through the same class I was in not twenty minutes before hand. Shocked I bumped my camera off the desk and it broke. I stuck out my hand like I did before and suddenly everything is going backwards. And sure enough as soon as I stop the camera is back on my desk as if it never dropped at all. Of course I decide I had to test to see if that was real. Listen to an answer from a classmate, rewind and then gave it before she did. Of course knowing what was about to go down I try to rush to the bathroom were all this started. You know what?"

"What?"  
"I find a new reason to hate that teacher ever day. Anyway I get back to the bathroom at the time I originally went in. No plan or anything. The only thing I know is that I may as well get this brilliant shot of a butterfly that came in through the window that I got the first time around. So the scene starts to replay as it did before. I take cover behind the last stall when Nathan Prescott. The kid with the gun comes in. The bluenette comes in soon after..."

"Bluenette?"

"Shut up," Max grumbled. "She thought it was a hella awesome way to describe her hair colour. Anyway I panic, I can't just confront a gunman and I wasn't very confident back then. Thankfully I'm right next to the fire alarm. Bad news is its behind glass and the hammer thing was missing. I had to hear the girl get shot twice more before I found it. I pick it up as she gets shot on the third loop. I rewind again and realise the hammer has come with me. I don't hesitate, and smash that fucking glass. It distracted Prescott long enough for the girl with the blue hair to escape."

"And then?"

"I reported it to the Principal," Max continued. "Like the foolish little idiot I was. The Prescotts owned the town and the school at the time."

"Pfft," Clare said. "How destitute were they? Couldn't even afford a small moon."

Max laughed out loud "You can't own a moon."

"Well not in Federation space," Clare admitted.

"You're shitting me you can own a moon," Max said. "Hello new impossible aspirational life goal."

"Please continue your story."

"So the rest of the afternoon became the quest of random teenage bullshit," Max said. "Luckily my new powers helped a bit, especially in the side quest entitled the universe is petty and Alyssa is its chew toy. It cumulated in me meeting my best bro Warren in the parking lot to return his flash drive and observe his alleged car."

"Public transport is excellent these days," Clare said. "No more clunkers."

"Oh but it was such a classic teenage shit box," Max said with a slight smile. "And not as shit as the school was at the time. You think if the Principal was going to let Nathan Prescott off with a limp warning he could have at least kept my name out of it. Warren stepped up and got punched in the face but my true saviour of that afternoon came roaring up in a chariot of rust. Scared Prescott away after nearly running us all over. It was the girl with the blue hair, the one who should have died, the best friend I hadn't talked to in five years, Chloe Price. Between time travel and that, well that was more surprising. We went to the lighthouse, I told her everything. And despite the hurt between us she believed me."

"Really?"

"Well of course she wanted a demonstration the next day," Max said. "But she believed that I believed it, there some more stuff but I'd like expand my time travel knowledge base a bit before getting into it. I figure there is a bit more to go on then science fiction both good and bad these days."

"I will have to share," Clare racked her brain for a suitable description of Max's abilities. "Knowledge of your temporal inversion abilities with our researchers maybe we can trace some records of similar incidents."

"Temporal what?" Max asked. "Mind if I just keep calling it rewind powers? Wait do these future people know what rewind even means?"

"Yes Max they know what rewind means," Clare reassured her.

Clare noticed the young woman was once again clutching at the wrist band that seemed important to her.

"Did that belong to Chloe?" she asked.

"Shaka Brah."

Clare took that as a yes.

"So time travel to solve teenage problems?" Clare asked.

"Yeah, totally irresponsible yes?"

"I wouldn't know I've never had time travel powers."

"There was one time I most definitely did abuse them," Max admitted. "Forgive me Saint Kate, its been at least one hundred years since I admitted to my failings. I kissed Chloe Price 47 times and she only knew about one of them."

"I'm sensing a story here."

"We really reconnected," Max elaborated. "More than I ever hoped. By the morning of day three it was almost like there had never been distance between us. After some teenage shenanigans the previous night I needed fresh clothes and she felt comfortable enough to loan me some that belonged to another dear friends of hers."

Max stopped and took a sip of her cooling coffee.

"They so weren't my style," Max said. "Of course we end up joking about it, I say I'm ready for the mosh pit Shaka Brah."

"I think I see why that phrase is important to you."

"Chloe calls me on it of course," Max said with a sigh. "I was never the daring one after all, but then Chloe was daring me to kiss her. Giving me shit about maybe I had already and rewound so she didn't know. I decided I 'd show her and kissed her. She was so adorably shocked and at a loss for words. I rewound and re-did it another forty six times. Each kiss was as awkward and as prefect as the first time around. Heck I only stopped because I felt a nose bleed threatening to start."

"And she's still as stunned as the first time around?" Clare asked.

"Not for too long," Max said blushing a little. "Flirty Chloe is Best Chloe. But that was the last time I used my abilities in such a wasteful, yeah lets go with wasteful, manner. All because of what happened that afternoon and the next morning."

Clare noticed that Max had dropped her right arm to her side and was holding it with her left, a tight grip on her wrist band again.

"We can stop for today if you want," Clare said as she reached for the padd.

"Ummm," Max was as eloquent as ever. "No I think its best if I keep going, it relates to my other time travel ability. You see that afternoon we found out something about Chloe's other dear friend and well it upset her, she dropped me back at the school dorms and rushed off to be alone."

"I got in contemplative mood myself," Max continued. "I pulled out an old photograph and just stared at it trying to figure out why Chloe could be so angry with well everything, compared to the smiling girl with me in the photo. As I continued to stare the image came into sharp focus and I heard voices. Then bang I'm in my extra awkward thirteen year old body on the worst possible day."

"How exactly was it the worst possible day for you?" Clare asked in the most compassionate tone.

"It was the day Chloe's dad died," Max elaborated. "I was full of myself and decided to change it, change it so Chloe would be happy again. When I snapped back I found out how wrong I was."

"What exactly do you mean by snap back?" Clare asked.

"Only way I can really describe it."

"I'll just flag it as a science question, please continue."

"I changed reality or created an alternative timeline or something," Max said. "People I considered my enemies were friendly to me, I was a member of and organisation I disliked and to top it off Chloe, she was..."

"Its okay if you can't continue Max."

"No I have to, Chloe was confined to a wheelchair, she couldn't move anything from the neck down. The change I made led to her getting a car from her Dad for her sixteenth birthday, that led to the accident and Chloe with out a Max to support her as she slowly loses hope."

"With out a Max?"

"The Alternative me," Max said. "I was so concerned about Chloe that I didn't think to snoop inwards, that's my real super power you know my nosiness, but I'm pretty sure alternative me was a bitch. I found a letter from her to Chloe, it read like something written as an obligation rather than..."

"I understand," Clare said.

"Should have checked her, my, phone or journal or something," Max said. "Because Chloe and I reconnected for a second time that week, why would I deny myself that? why would I deny Chloe that?"

"I wouldn't know."

"You know how I said I was a snoop?"

"Yes."

"Well I spent the night of day three in that alternate world and I found out how much worse it could get," Max was openly crying. "She was dying so slowly, her respiratory system...it..."

"Max we can leave this if its too difficult."

"I killed her," Max said. "She wanted her last memory to be of us together as she went out on her own terms. She asked me to...with the morphine. I'd already seen her die six maybe seven times that week, no problem just rewind. But this, this was the hardest. I did as she asked, should have kissed her on the lips to make sure she knew how much she meant to me no matter what universe we were in. I watched her die again, no rewinding this time, I couldn't do that to her. Helping her with that, it was the right thing to do. No second guessing."

"Are we still in this alternative universe you created?" Clare asked.

"No," Max said. "I found the photo in one of Chloe's album. The one I took of her and her dad, it didn't exist in the original time line, so this could be an alternative timeline I guess, but not that one. So anyway I set wrong what I thought I had set right. When I snapped back my Angry bitter blue haired Chloe was back. I found the photo later, hidden in what I always called her treasure chest. She'd written on the back 'Thanks for the great last memory of Dad Maxaroni'. I shut down for a week after reading that, it was just too much. I couldn't talk about it after all."

"Well we can talk now," Clare said. "Everything and any thing, we'll get through this together Max."

"Can we not talk any more today?" Max asked. "I just..."

"I understand Max," Clare said with a nod. "In fact counselor's orders are to not think about time travel at all for the rest of the evening. Come I'll show you just how impressive modern public transport is."

Clare helped the emotionally exhausted Max to her feet and wonder just what happened on day five could be worse than that.

Up Time: Betrayal

"Max this, Max that, what about Rachel Amber huh? Max comes back and you forget all about her."

"You'll never forget her dumb ass."

"Max wasn't there for me Rachel was, is."

"The graffiti, some one changed it, he changed it its. Max no, not her don't take her to."

"Shush its okay. Max is safe."

"Rachel Amber that missing girl?"

"We were friends."

"I know that look."

"Yeah but nothing more than close friends."

"You don't know that she's just waiting for me to find her. Hey get off of me."

"Just be quiet and let her hug you. Amber there did find her. Imagine how badly it could go then make it infinitely worse. That is how it goes down."

"Impossible."

"How are you not all torn up by this Stormy? You are from the day Max's vision came true right?"

"Max told me what happened so I know intellectually, I didn't get the raw emotional impact Amber is still going through."

"I volunteer to go through the quantum transporter thing next."

"Which one are you again?"

"Max went to San Francisco because she entered her photo. I called her because the storm came. She saved me again didn't she?"

"That she did Phony."

"Really?"

"What?"

"Caulfield, phony, did the blue dye do something to your brain?"

"That's got to be it, you're all phonies, vortex club fakes. I would never betray Rachel Amber like this not for anyone, especially not for that bitch Max Caulfield."

"When we get back we'll be having words Chloe."

"Okay only one way to describe how both of you talking at once like that sounded, it was hella awesome."


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: The Scary Punk Ghost of Arcadia Bay**

Now: Arcadia bay appreciation day

Commander Heather Peterson scanned with her Tricorder again and once again she wished the U.S.S. Everett was in system. But with what had started to become known as the Hobus Super Nova disaster it was being run around the beta quadrant both in its regular Starfleet duties providing aid to displaced people and with its duties to the Department of Temporal Investigation. Thankfully there had only been three attempts to subvert the timeline so far. But still it left Peterson without the Nova class vessel's finely tuned sensors to cut through the Chroniton fog that seemed to blanket the entire town. All that she could be certain of was the readings were higher here at the lighthouse, the weird science and arts school, and a historic house that pre-dated world war three.

"Any luck Heather?"

She turned and saw Agent Ranjea walking up the path towards her, his bald Deltan head glistening in the sunlight. Taking a few seconds to calm herself, his Deltan physiology was going to affect her no matter how long she had worked with the man, she just shook her head.

"I can postulate a theory on why there are so many chronitons," she explained. "But I need more scans and I can't get more scans because Admiral Janeway is monopolising ESDs sensors and has them all pointed towards Hobus. Any luck on your end?"

"Only one mention in the records," The beautiful Deltan said. "But its from before our time displaced person was even born, although it does involve other time displacees."

"Really?"

"George and Gracie were rescued about eighty kilometres off shore."

"Wow," was the science officers reply. "Just wow."

"Clare has gained some relative information from our displacee though," Ranjea said as they set off down the path. "The girl claims that it wasn't the first time she has time traveled."

"She didn't get caught up in the Temporal cold war did she?"

"Not as far as we know," he said. "She claims she just developed the ability to rewind time in response to a traumatic event, naturally further details are private and Clare hasn't revealed them to me or anyone else."

"How could she do that without shielding?" Heather asked. "Even those mysterious uptime travelers who do it without ships must have a version of the personal shield that the S.C.E are putting through testing right now."

"We do not know but Clare believes that the young woman, Max, at least believes she did."

"Where's your partner anyway?"

"Interviewing the three young people who found our latest mystery," he explained. "I thought it best she start with out me, teenagers who are unaccustomed to Deltan's can sometimes have strange reactions, so I figure we take the long way back into town."

"Fine by me," Peterson said. "In fact we have to stop at one of the sites, mentioning George and Gracie reminded me of an old Klingon scanning protocol that I could try."

"If it turns up anything I'll treat you to this wonderful thing at the town's Diner called a Belgian waffle," Ranjea said. "Its almost as good as Deltan group bonding."

"That must be some waffle."

* * *

Agent Teresa Garcia sighed, just her luck to get the one Tellarite on earth who was being rebellious by being more traditional.

"Your Chroniton readings mean nothing," he said. "I think the woman has unlocked the secrets of interplanetary transporters, see if she is on a missing person report on Mars or maybe even the Alpha Centuri colonies."

"Oh yeah, well I think you wouldn't know a tricorder from a sandwich," Garcia said from a half smirk. "How would you even scan for Chronitons when you've already ate it."

Surprisingly the young Tellarite turned to the young Vulcan female he was sitting net to.

"She's cool Captain," he said. "We can share our information with her."

"Sorry for setting Van on you like that," T'ler said. "My crew and I, well we've noticed a few suspicious people the past couple of days since we found that woman. But Van here, I've learned to trust his emotional judgement in these situations. David call in M'arshda."

The young human whistled a little tune and a young Caitian barely older than kitten age came slinking in the back door.

"Science Officer hand the DTI agent the tricorder," T'ler said. The caitian female nodded and passed Garcia the device.

"That is Van's," T'ler explained. "It should have data from before and after the Young Woman's arrival. M'arshda has been keeping it safe from suspicious persons as not having witnessed the woman's arrival we believed she would be overlooked until we could get it to the proper authorities. We believe that is the Department of Temporal Investigations in this case."

"Chroniton readings?" Garcia asked.

"Chroniton readings." T'ler concurred. "With that in mind my crew and I would like to offer our services during your investigation."

"Your crew?" Garcia said unsure.

"As a future Starfleet crew we have responsibilities to both the truth and accepting over site from the DTI when appropriate."

"Well okay then," Garcia said. "First how did the young woman get to the lighthouse."

"One moment she was not there and the next moment she was," T'ler explained. "There was no know transporter effect in the intervening time."

"I can confirm what the captain saw," David said.

"I was looking away from were the woman appeared," Van said. "I cannot rule out a transporter but can confirm that she was not there when I looked away but was there when I looked back."

"Hmmm," Garcia considered that it was more like the merging of quantum information from concurrent running time lines folded back into one.

"We have some additional information to share as well," T'ler said. "Go up to the wall of fame over there. The old faded photo about half way down on the right."

Garcia got up and wandered over and took a look. There was a photo of their time displacee, looking about five years older, the thick strip had been writing on with on word, Max."

"I had always wondered who she was," David said. "And I couldn't shake the feeling the woman looked familiar."

"I did some further digging on Captain T'ler's orders," M'arshda said. "The woman, presumably Max mentioned a person named Chloe. Records are understandable spotty from the time period, that picture seems to have been taken during to the lead up to World War three, and the fact the this town was hit by a nuclear detonation during the conflict means not many local records survived."

"But you found something?" Garcia asked.

"Don't doubt my crew agent," T'ler said sternly.

"Birth Records," M'arshda said handing over a padd. "For a Chloe Price and a Maxine Caulfield."

"Interesting," Garcia said. "We can definitely use this in our investigation but who is this Chloe?"

"If I may?" M'arshda said gesturing to the padd. Garcia handed it back and the young caitian touched a few buttons.

"Fascinating," T'ler said observing the centuries old mugshot.

"How so?" Garcia asked.

"Is that the scary punk ghost of Arcadia Bay?" Van asked.

"Boo-yah," David said with a nod.

* * *

"Are we sure about this?" Peterson asked as she scanned an empty field next to the Grant Academy for Art and Science. "I mean they are still kids."

"Kids who showed due diligence," Ranjea said with a nod. "And gave a weird confirmation of something we had already discovered."

"Besides most myths have a basis in fact," Garcia said. "At least the ones that last this long."

"But didn't the girl say this ghost was supposed to haunt the old gym that's still standing over there."

"Hey Clare contacted me with some new information on the way up here," Garcia said. "And when the temporal displacee says scan a place you should probably scan a place."

"And I think it just paid off," Ranjea said checking his readings.

"What have you got boss?"

"Heather can you confirm these readings?"

"Chronitons," Peterson confirmed. "Wait is that?"

"A human thought pattern," he nodded.

"Does this mean what I think it means?" Peterson asked.

"T'Viss is going to have to revise all her theoretical models again," Garcia said darkly not wanting to think of the implications herself.

Uptime: Honesty

"Welcome back."

"Hey Vanilla. How's Amber?"

"Sleeping, the Shaka brahs are watching over her."

"Shaka Brahs? That was just before Max..."

"They're trying to figure out how many times."

"And I was giving her crap about trying it and undoing it."

"Apparently Max liked it a lot."

"And Chloe?"

"Still angry."

"I'll talk to her."

"Just remember Max never came back to her."

"That's the sad part Max did come back to her, she just doesn't know it."

"Chloe?"

"Go away."  
"You miss Rachel, I get it dude, I miss her to."

"Doesn't seem like it."

"Max and I found out some stuff she was hiding from me, well us and I'm still trying to process it."

"Lies, everybody lies, even to themselves."

"I know that all to well. But consider what you are actually lying to yourself about."

"What does that mean?"

"The worst fight we ever had with Rachel, remember what it was about?"

"No."

"Don't lie Chloe."

"It was about nothing."

"A nothing named Max, the phone you kept just in case."

"The one I've devoted an entire draw to, Rachel didn't understand, I can't believe I yelled at her for touching it."

"Rachel was forbidden from touching that draw. Remember why Rache bought that poster, you know the one?"

"No. I know which one but she had put it up when I'd step out to deal with step-prick for some reason."

"She was covering evidence of Max, remember there was a companion piece to the everybody lies graffiti."

"Did...does Max have an explanation as to why she never...why she...Why did she leave me?"

"Oh Chloe, you think Max wanted to?"

"Why didn't she at least text or something?"

"Honestly we haven't got into it yet, but imagine Max starting a new school in a new town without her fellow pirate to support her."

"Okay I can see that. Suppose you want me to go in the merge thing with you now."

"No, you deserve a proper reunion with Max. You'll get to see how hella awesome it is to have the hippy back


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5: Blue everywhere and it sucks**

Now: Brooke and Warren's legacy festival

"So how are you finding the DTI's temporary accommodation?" Clare asked Max as they walked through the San Francisco streets to the closest transporter pad.

"Liveable," Max replied. "Honestly its a palace compared to some places if bunked down in before, the Seattle district when I was a photojournalist assigned there in the 2020s, horrible, the dead rat was probably the third best room mate I ever had though."

"I'm sensing a but?"

"It's my neighbours."

"How so?" Clare asked.

"They're nice people," Max said. "Made me feel very welcome and all it's just..."

"Just?"

"There's a family of, what are the blue bald people with the ridge on their face called again?"

"Bolian."

"Right a family of Bolians, dad, son and one of the daughters are almost the exact same colour as Chloe's hair was. And it that wasn't enough there is an Andorian three doors down that reminds me of the colour her hair was were it started to fade to its natural colour at the roots."

"We can look into other arrangements if you'd like?"

"No I can deal," Max replied. "Been doing it my entire adult life after all."

"And that is the reason for today's T-shirt?" Clare asked.

Max looked down at the salmon coloured garment emblazoned with the word Priceless.

"Yeah," Max said sadly. "You know if you don't laugh you cry and I was sick of crying just because my friends were streaming Antiques Roadshow or some crap like that."

Clare double checked her slang and terms cheat sheet. Streaming was not too dissimilar to how 2d entertainment was distributed now.

"Now if anything gets too intense just tell me and we can leave immediately," Clare said as the stepped onto the transporter pad. "Arcadia Bay, Oregon, please."

The computer that ran the transporter station beeped in acknowledgement. Max marveled once again at the scientific wonder as San Francisco seemed to dissolve from her perspective to be replaced by a part of Arcadia Bay that was very familiar to her.

"It survived?" Max asked herself.

"Are you coming Max?" Clare asked from further up the alleyway.

"Huh what? Sorry," Max said as she joined Clare at the front of the Diner. "I was just wondering if...?"

"We can get some waffles after if you like."

"How did you know?"

"Agent Ranjea has recommended them to everyone."

Max looked up at the Diner's sign, it now read three whales and the sign depicted three, the smallest probably a newly born calf. She would so be asking about that later.

* * *

Their destination was even more unbelievable. How could the new owners leave the garage door like that? Did some historian think it was a style from her time period? Not realising it was the result of teenager morning her father. Max shook her head, shouldn't she be thinking it should have been knocked down by the nuclear explosion. It was after all closer to the light house than the diner. Max filed that away to ask about later, she was after all here to help science the hell out of her displacement.

"Max this is Agent Teresea Garcia and Agent Ranjea," Clare introduced them. "They've been handling the actual time travel part of the incident."

"Nice to meet you both," Max said. "I'm Max of course."

"Oh is that our time traveler," said a woman coming up the path.

"Oh and that's Commander Heather Peterson," Clare said completing the introductions. "She's from Starfleet but we don't hold it against her."

"They just like me for my tricorder," Heather pouted. "Mr. Graham will be here to let us in momentarily, he was just finishing his waffles."

"We must of just missed each other down near the diner."

"Well we can't all have Lucksly's sense of timing," Heather said with shrug. "Here he comes now."

A large man who Max figured had many ethnicities in his background came up the path.  
"Thank you for coming all the way from Jupiter station Mr. Graham," Garcia said.

"Hey its no problem," he said. "Beside some one has to check no one has painted over the historic graffiti every so often."

"You're not related to the Mars Graham's are you?" Max asked.

"No but my husband is," he said. "All the way back to Brooke and Warren Graham. And you are?"

"Max," she explained. "Max Caulfield, I was best man at Warren and Brooke's wedding."

"Max, the other woman Max?"

"What no?" Max said. "I was the one that set them up together, sure Warren had a thing for me...but that was all one sided compared to our friendship. I was the one who got Warren over his cold feet for dog's sake."

"Not my opinion but it was defiantly Brooke's according to the history my hubby has been compiling on his downtime between dropping of relief supplies in the former neutral zone. And she did have a mysterious change in attitude half way out to Mars. Gerrald is back in system on Friday come out to Jupiter station and have diner with us."

"As the starving artist stereotype I would be grateful to accept," Max said. "As long as I wasn't intruding I mean space is still large right and it takes awhile to get anywhere so you probably haven't seen each other in..."

"Oh he'll be getting in early that morning," Mr. Graham said blushing. "I'll be needing a break by then to be honest."

"Then I shall see you Friday," Max said. "Now great Aunty Max must not keep the nice agents waiting any longer young man."

"I'll wait out here then until you're finished."

"Okay were do we start Max," Garcia asked.

"Kitchen and living area," Max said. "That's...that's were I used the version with the photographs and created an alternative universe. Well where I arrived. Upstairs is where I used the rewind power more extensively."

"Lead the way please Max?" Heather asked and they made their way upstairs. Leaving Clare with the two DTI agents.

"So?"

"Teresea you know I can't tell you anything," Clare admonished. "Just by telling you that her time travel abilities manifested to save a person named Chloe Price I may have over stepped my bounds."

"But we have already confirmed the existence of Miss Price," Ranjea said. "And her connection to the time travel incident thanks to local talent."

"Local...isn't that what the uptime agencies refer to us as sometimes?"

"You'll have to excuse him," Garcia said. "He thinks he spotted Jena Noi today and believes we've beaten them to the punch for once. He's rubbing it in in case they're listening."

* * *

Upstairs Max ran her fingers over the fade cartoon version of Chloe that proclaimed the human propensity for lying. She looked at the bit that had been covered by that notorious poster so many centuries before. Max doesn't want to ever lie to you. It followed with a surprising optimistic list of reasons Max hadn't called or wrote or texted or Skyped or whatever the heck you called it when you used social media. All involving Max not wanting to worry Chloe or causing her to do something reckless.

 _Oh Chloe I won't lie to you,_ she thought, _the reason I didn't call was because I was a complete and utter dunsel._

"So more evidence of the so called ghost of Arcadia bay?" Heather asked breaking Max out of it while indicating.

"I can't believe that story survived," Max said. "I'm glad it did and not the story it replaced."

"So you made it all up?"

"Yeah," Max said. "May have helped it along some when I found the right wig."

"Then why the old gym instead of," Heather thought for a moment, "where we found most of the time travel echoes at the school?"

"That's easy the gym is were we did some living," Max explained. "Were as the other place, I wouldn't burden her with that. Try closer to the Wardrobe."

"Ah-ha that's got it yes," Heather said looking at the readings. "I think I have a working hypothesis, T'Viss will never believe this, Korath has the right models but he would so weaponize this, no we need more data."

"Then you'll need to go to the Junk yard if its still there and then, surely the railway is gone by now but there is a spot about two miles from the yard along the tracks or were they used to be."

"What the hell is a mile?"

Max gave her a look.

"Just kidding," Heather said with a laugh. "They wouldn't make these tricorders without conversions for all known measurement systems. One more thing?"

"Yes."

"How did you just blank Ranjea like that?" Heather asked. "I mean I've been working with him for a while and I still get all...even though I know its a look don't touch situation, naughty me I still think about touching and here you are in a teenage body no less and you're just like nope, but nice to meet you."

Clare had briefed Max on the possible affects the deltan might have but Max's hunch seemed to be correct.

"The answer is simple, the place the scary punk ghost haunts the most is here," Max said as she pointed right at her own heart.

Uptime: Different

The Shaka brahs came back into the room as one singular Chloe and went to relieve Vanilla of Amber sitting duty.

"So how many times?"  
"47," Shaka said as she sat down.

"I'm mad jealous right now, 47 wonder if that's significant?"  
"Probably not, probably just when she thought she was overtaxing her powers."

"Still you have 47 Max kisses and I have none," Vanilla complained.

"Go get something to eat."

Vanilla gave Stormy their de facto leader a nod as she passed. It was amazing that with so many people that looked the same they could keep track of who was who. Surprisingly it wasn't her, with her blonde hair and more conservative style wasn't the one that stood out. That honour belonged to Stormy with her serenity, Amber with her despair and Chloe with her anger and bitterness. It felt right to let her use the name over anybody else. After all hadn't she also been filled with these things until Max came back. Her pancakes appeared from the device their host called a replicator.

She heard a thunk as a plate of bacon was dropped haphazardly opposite her.

"Why the fuck are you so different than the rest of us?"

"Short answer is Max," Vanilla said. "Now eat your bacon while I give you the long answer."

"I don't have to if a I don't want to."

"Just do it," Vanilla said. "I don't want you saying anything stupid until I'm finished."

"Okay," Chloe replied. "Not like I was going to waste it."

"Max saved Dad, you know the day he died, well for me it was the day he couldn't find his keys and Max was acting super weird. The others have filled me in that weird Max was most likely future Max some how inhabiting...controlling the Max of that day. To say that her actions had unforeseen consequences would be an understatement."

"For awhile everything was great, other than Max moving away of course, then Dad got me a car."

"And that's a bad thing how?"

'Don't interrupt," Vanilla scolded. "You don't know how it feels, one moment you're driving along thinking maybe next spring break you could drive up to Seattle confront Max about why see hasn't written and the next you don't actually know if you're alive any more because you can't feel anything. I was paralysed."

"More lies."

Vanilla reached over the table and grabbed Chloe by the ears and hauled her up to look her in the eyes.

"I couldn't even wipe my own ass!"

"GAH!" Chloe exclaimed as Vanilla dropped her.

"We need to get you out of this room," Vanilla said to herself with nod. "Yes you are coming with me to my next physiotherapy session. So I was stuck in a motorised wheel chair for the rest of my, as it turned out, very short amount of days. I didn't even have the opportunity to get kicked out of Blackwell, I never knew Rachel Amber as anything more than that Blackwell girl that went missing and despite having both Mom and Dad there for me I was destroying everything. The finances, their relationship with the extended family. everything."

"And that all happened because Max wanted to make you happy! The you that still resides in these other Chloes, except for maybe Stormy who seems to finally be over herself and her bullshit."

Chloe looked thoughtful.

"Stop thinking it," Vanilla scolded.

"What?"

"That you would give anything for more time with Dad. Yes it was great but the price is too damn high. The price Max paid was to damn high."

"What's that mean?"

"Max came back I was happy again," Vanilla explained. "If I had know what was going on I wouldn't asked of her what I did."

"Huh?"

"I wanted to die happy Chloe," Vanilla explained. "Max obliged."

"Shit you're in love with her to?"

"She has killed for me despite the pain it caused her," Vanilla sighed. "And I suspect found a way her time travel could actually save me, save all of us."

"Yeah well she didn't save Rachel Amber and she hasn't saved me," Chloe grunted.

"You're wrong," Vanilla said. "Max is going to, is in the process and has saved you. You just don't know it yet."


	7. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6: Other Time Displaced Persons**

Now: Story and waffle time

"So why is it called the Three whales?" Max asked as she dug into her Belgian Waffles while the Bolsic teen of indeterminate gender poured her a Bajoran tea that apparently went well with breakfast food.

"Bit before my time that story I think hun," the Bolsic said.

"Actually I can answer that," Ranjea said from across the table after he had finished his mouthful of waffles.

"Really?"

"Indeed it involves other time displaced persons," Ranjea explained. "George, Gracie and their son Harpo."

"The whales?" Clare asked. "Oh I know I'm not suppose to but I do love this story."

"One of the few instances where time travel was a positive force without question," Ranjea said. "Except of course for the transparent aluminium question and the glasses."

"You've lost me," Max said.

"You aren't the first time traveler from the area," Ranjea explained. "Late last century a ship of mysterious origins entered the solar system and began transmitting a message to earth, it did not receive the response it wanted. It started to play havoc with all earth based systems. Thankfully an inbound ship figured out the message was not meant for humans ears."

"So who was it for?" Max asked.

"Humpback whales," Ranjea said.

"But they went extinct in the 2040s," Max said. "Some places were getting desperate for food, even though the whale population had been holding steady for thirty years we as a species still took to much."

"Well that ship I mentioned had the means of saving them from extinction," Ranjea said. "Spock who had invented time travel and Captain James T. Kirk."

"Who were they?"

"You'll learn about them soon enough," Clare assured her.

"Long story short they managed to locate a breeding pair and return with them to their own time frame. In fact according the reports they rescued George, Gracie and the unborn Harpo from a whaling vessel off the coast from here during the ninteen-eighties."

"Wait this ship didn't look like a giant green bird did it?" Max asked.

"How do you know that?" Clare asked.

"I got told the story about why it was called the two whales as a kid by a guy who used to be a whaler," Max said. "He joined Greenpeace after some aliens took an interest in humpback whales or at least that's what he told me and Chloe."

"The ship was Klingon yes," Ranjea said. "But all crew were human or had human heritage."

"Were they at least pirates?" Max asked.

"I suppose considering they were crewing a prize vessel, they were wanted by both the Klingon empire and the Federation at the time and they time traveled to basically perform a kidnapping I guess you could say that yes they were pirates. Anyway the first sighting as the whales traveled north after arriving in this time frame was by the Diner's owner at the time, she took it as a sign to stick with it though she had been considering leaving earth entirely at the time."

"This Spock and Kirk sound like my kind of people," Max said as she grabbed a small furry paw that was trying to abscond with her last waffle. When she saw what the paw was attached to she kind of lost it.

"Kitty," she said. "U can no haz waffle."

"Uh," said the young caitian whimpered.

"You have to excuse Max," Clare explained. "She's from the 21st century."

"You can haz cheeseburger if you take me for a ride on your boat."

"Okay," M'arshda said as she slipped free. "We did our history lessons on early computer networks last year. Humans took pet videos much to far."

Ranjea turned to see T'ler and the rest of the 'deep space exploration' crew. He turned his head puzzled.

"Excuse me but are you wearing nose plugs?" he asked.

"A logical precaution when dealing with species that have pheromones that may have a debilitating effect."

"T'ler," young David said as he came up behind the Vulcan girl. "I was wrong I'll need some plugs."

"I will not say I told you so," T'ler said neutrally.

"Thanks for letting me try captain," he said as he placed the device in his nostrils.

"Please drop my science officer Ms. Caulfield."

"But...kitty...?" Max shook off whatever had come over her. "I'm so sorry, that was embarrassing."

"For the both of us," said M'arshda as she dropped down onto the seat next to Max. "Sorry I tried to take your waffle."

"That's okay they are very good," Max said. "Not quite as good as Joyce's."

"These are almost as good as Deltan group bonding," Ranjea said. "Are you saying they used to be better?"

"I don't know maybe Joyce put more love into the recipes."

"Which brings up the reason we are here," T'ler said. "It would be illogical to waste the opportunity to learn more about a fragmented part of our local history while we have a first hand source available."

"Well lets start with Joyce, her two husbands and her daughter," Max said with a smile. "And we'll see how far we get before I have to go."

Uptime: History

Stormy was escorted through the corridors apparently the computer didn't mind her searching for some things but the one thing she needed to know was off limits. The computer was more than happy to explain that it would be a violation of the Temporal Prime Directive. So she had requested an audience with her hosts. She disliked the armed escorts but she guessed it was protocol. Her discomfort didn't last long as the security guard halted as she went through the door to the Admiral's ready room.

"Ah Chloe I knew I'd see you sooner or later," Admiral Ducane said as he put down his padd and took his feet off his desk. "You have questions?"

"Yeah do you have answers?"

"Of course," he said. "You understand I may not be able to give you all of them."

"The Temporal prime directive?"

"Time travel is fraught with dangers," Ducane explained. "I'm sure you are aware of the dangers in meddling in the past."

Stormy nodded, she had chosen to sacrifice herself to save Max and Arcadia bay because of those dangers, Vanilla her alternative self existed because of such dangers.

"But there's more to it than that isn't there."

"Ask your self this, is it a good idea to know your own future?"

"Hmm, I guess it depends on when you found out the information."

"An interesting answer."

"So is that why the computer won't tell me anything about Max?"

"Partially," he said. "I'm sure you are aware why some information about Max would remain classified."

Chloe nodded, "I guess its rare for Max to be able to do what she does without all the tech around here."

"We know of a few species that can," Ducane said. "But none of them are the equivalent of a base line human without a shred of augmented DNA in her family history."

Stormy thought for a moment and a massive grin crept across her face.

"I'll be seeing Max again."

"Well I certainly didn't tell you," Ducane said with a smile. "Now is there anything else?"

"Yeah actually can you put time travel for dummies onto one of those padd things for me?"

"Actually how about you indulge and old man and let him teach you what he knows, one time traveler to another?"

"Yeah okay," Stormy said. "Longer I'm up here the less opportunity I have to strangle Chloe. And please call me Stormy while there are still so many of me around."

The Admiral chuckled a bit then set to the lesson.

"Regular causality a leads to b leads to c," he began. "Introduce time travel and suddenly action c, event b or consequence a can now be at the start of the chain..."


	8. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7:Alumni of Blackwell and their Descendants**

Now: A perfect day for viewing the red spot

The camera flashed and Max's camera printed out the most epic selfie she had taken so far, not just since her arrival in this future but perhaps her entire life. Gerrald Graham just stared at the woman out of time as he sipped his glass of chateau Ppicard, she looked exactly like she did in the pictures his ancestors had bought to Mars with them when they had fled the worsening earth.

"You know," Max said as she shook the developing photo. "You look a lot like Brooke, you have Warren's nose though."

"I can't believe how accurate Great Gran Brooke's description of you is," he said as he took another sip of his wine.

"So did she really still think I wanted to get with Warren?" Max asked as she came to sit down next to her host on the couch and took up her own glass of wine.

"No," he said. "It was more she was always suspicious of her other half, honestly the family theory was that she only stopped worrying about it when she was sure they wouldn't be recalled to earth. But I found an old video file in the Martian Colonial archives just before I headed out last time and now I'm not sure."

"I kept telling Brooke I was more likely to make a play for her," Max sighed. "No that's not quite right, but the one person I did want to spend the rest of my life with did have better boobs than Warren."

She got a quiet chuckle in response to that.

"What were they like as teenagers?" Gerrald asked. "So little survives from their time on earth you know."

"Well Brooke," Max said contemplating her glass. "she was always droning on."

"Uh?"

"Sorry," Max said. "Bad puns are kind of my thing. She was always flying her quad-copter remote drone around, I think she might have used it to spy on Warren a bit to be honest but she was always incorporating it into art projects or science assignments. If she let you fly it you were among her closest friends. I think I flew it 4 times. No one was allowed near its successors because she built them all herself."

"And Great Grampy Warren?"

Max considered for awhile.

"Brave," she said. "In a willing to stand up for his friends kinda way, honest and goofy. Terrible photographer though but he was at our stupid school for the science side of things. Sometimes couldn't take a hint and that hella annoyed me but I always valued his advice and friendship. Oh and with out him I would have flunked so many science exams."

She passed her picture over to her friends' descendant to get his opinion on it. Max was perfectly framed and so was the view of the famous red spot storm. That view had been why they had chosen these particular quarters when they had moved to Jupiter Station for -'s holographic research.

"How can you get these kind of shots when you're not even looking through the viewfinder?" he asked.

"Practice," Max explained. "At least one photo a day since I was fourteen, fifteen."

"And you're older than you look because of your temporal displacement?"

"Yep," Max said as she took another sip. "Just got an update about that this mourning, exposure to exotic radiation interacting with chronitons, it was decided it was probably best if I didn't take any treatment to restore my actual age."

"So you've got another lifetime ahead of you," Gerrald said. "What are you going to do with it?"

"I've kinda lucked out there," Max admitted. "I can just sort of keep going on as a photographer, and because you guys have worked so hard on building this society I can actually focus on the art rather than take any job I can to make ends meet."

"And you don't want to try anything else you missed an opportunity on?"  
"No, although now that I can say I'm a time traveler without being locked up and experimented on I might finally be able to use some ideas I've had but haven't been able to use before."

"Foods on everyone," Gerrald's husband, Theo called. "Try the hasperat, I've always found it a good introduction for people who haven't tried cuisine from worlds other than their own."

Max took a bite. As she chewed a smile spread across her face.

"This is good," she said after swallowing it down. "Its from Bajor right?"

"Yes."

"I had a very nice tea blend that originated from there the other day so I looked up some other foods they make."

"Just remember that the original Bajoran version is about twice as spicy," Theo said. "If you ever make it out that way."

"Noted," Max said. "What other yum nums you got for great aunty Max?"

"Ploomek soup."

* * *

The night went on and Max tried many different foods from the worlds of the federation and discussed many things. The difference between replicated and non replicated food, Organising a bachelor party and how Warren was almost sick for it, relief efforts Gerrald was helping with after the recent disaster Max still hadn't learnt about and finally How much art there was in the holographic sciences.

"So you have people like the doctor," Theo explained. "Who were pretty much sentient out of the box due to the complexity of their holomatrix, then you have the ones who've simply been left running, this is were most of our current research is focused on."

"Though much like the Fair Haven program we told you about the programs tend to interrupt things so that it fits into their preprogrammed world view.

"We're seeing some interesting things from that Hamlet program that Ferengi entrepreneur Schmenge has left running,"- said.

"Please any scientific value from that is tainted by the recordings being the number one selling entertainment to Cardassians over sixty."

"Now dear," Max admonished Gerrald in her best old lady voice. "Didn't you know your Great Grampy and Gran financed their Mars trip in a similar manner."

"Really? I didn't," he said. "I'll get the details when we both aren't as tipsy."

"Any how," Theo continued. "We then have two more categories, accidents, like professor Moriarty and then there's Vic, and no ones sure about him, not even his own programmer."

"So then you are working on seeing if nurture could be important to a hologram that's left running?" Max asked.

"Not just that but a hologram that develops similarly to humanoid life," he said while looking over at his husband. "By the time we get through planning and every thing we might be ready for children."

"Child rearing," Max said. "Now there is an art I don't think anyone has mastered."

"And a science that is not understood at all," Gerrald agreed.

Uptime: Struggle

"Your nerve tissue has responded well to the treatment," The doctor with the shimmering hair that played through a series of images said. "But we still need to get you used to the fact that your body has healed and now has full range of movement."

"I thought I had, I mean I am walking around and stuff aren't I?" Vanilla asked. The doctor shook her head.

"Observe your Quantum Sister notice what she is doing."

"She's fidgeting,"

"What?" Chloe asked when she realised she was being observed.

"And I'm not," Vanilla said with realisation.

Stormy and Ducane observed the scene from the Doctors office.

"So you're saying that if I was to reintegrate with Vanilla I would get her memories but not aspects of her personality?"

"No you would retain some of those traits," Ducane explained. "But you would be dominant because this is your home time stream."

"No its Chloe's," Stormy corrected.

"Ah but you and Chloe have the lowest phase variance, much less than one per cent."

"And Vanilla has the highest variance?"

"A little over one percent."

"Its a struggle to get my head around you know," Stormy admitted. "Much harder than my best friend can time travel. Why didn't the Shaka Brahs collapse into each other on the transporter pad?"

"We don't know, I hope that makes you realise we haven't figured out all the mysteries of the time stream."

"Dude mind if I go get my grub on?" Stormy said. "Even If I don't think any better on a full stomach, at least my stomach is full."

"Okay," he said. "Next lesson should be a more fun kind of mind blowing."

Stormy left just in time to catch up with Vanilla and Chloe as they were leaving. The Doctor came over and sat at her desk and looked at Ducane.

"We have one win today," she told him. "Chloe may just believe Vanilla is telling the truth."

"Good," he said. "Just waiting is becoming a bit of a struggle."

"The real struggle is this afternoon, I have an appointment with Amber."

"We can always assign some one else to this."

"No its just hard seeing her, any version of her like this. But she has just seen Great Aunty Max attacked, maybe even killed from her point of view. Add that on top of...no its always…. Curse the temporal prime directive."

"I've been wondering is some of Chloe's anger is to prevent her from feeling like Amber does," Ducane pondered.

"Sir leave this to the professionals," she said. "Although getting Amber to feel anything else at the moment might be a win. I wonder if I still have those old sub routines in here some where."

Her faced morphed into a smile emoji.

"Good luck Doctor Graham," Admiral Ducane said as he left.


	9. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8: Edith, Shelan, Chloe**

Now: Its always the middle of the night some where

Clare managed to get up to answer the incoming call on the third try. When the screen turned on it merely displayed the Federation of Planets Emblem and the name of the caller.

"Max? What's wrong?"

"Clare why does the Universe hate time travelers?"

"What do you mean?"

"It...it gives you everything and snatches it away, forces you...forces you to give it up, makes you the one with the responsibility and the guilt. Why did it let me be with Chloe like that when…?"

Max's voice trailed off into sobs and cries. Clare waited patiently as Max worked through her emotions.

"If it had only happened to me and Chloe I could handle it...The universe is cruel to allow a person to fall in love in those situations. Couldn't he have bought her to the future she dreamed of instead. Couldn't it have let me try again."

"Shit," Clare said lapsing into her own twentieth century bad habits. "Chapter Seven, you've read chapter seven of Kirk's biography."

"Why'd they have to die Clare?" Max asked. "Is it some kind of sick joke? Their blood for stability of the time stream?"

"Time travel is inherently dangerous."

"So is crossing the street," Max whimpered. "No this is different, the universe hates time travelers so much it makes us kill our loved ones so we're never tempted to do it again."

"What do you mean?"

"I killed Chloe Price," Max blurted out between sobs. "There universe I said it are you happy now."

"Max I'll be there in five minutes," Clare said as she closed the Channel and then opened another. "And I'll bring back up."

* * *

Five minutes later Max was barely acknowledging her door chime. The door opened and Clare was soon prying the hard copy of Kirk's biography that the Grahams had lent her out of the young woman's hands.

"Come on Max," she said. "Lets get you cleaned up."

She slowly guided the younger looking woman to the wash room and set the sonic shower. She pushed Max into the space and let it run. When the hum stopped she pulled Max out and guided her back out to the living area and sat her down on the desk chair while she took a seat on the couch.

"So Chloe shared a similar fate to Edith Keeler?"

Max nodded.

"And like James Kirk you had to stand by and watch the person you love die to restore the timeline?"

"Worse."

"How?"

"Had to go back," she said. "Not save her in the first place, make it like none of it ever happened, not only did I kill her I put all her hurt and pain and uncertainty back into her."

"Why did you have to go back?"

"Tornado would have wiped out the town," Max said. "Already seen it happen, day five stuff don't ask, I caused it by saving her."

"You caused the tornado?"

"My time travel," Max claimed. "Caused freaky weather and disrupted migratory animals, Snow in October, beached whales, unscheduled solar eclipse and the double moon. I finally got back to Chloe before the Tornado, we figure its coming for her, she shouldn't be alive, dead so many times over."

"And?"

"Choice, a horrible, choice," Max said. "The Bay or my Bae."

Clare quickly searched the slang on her cheat padd.

"It was too late to warn people," Max explained. "We were at the one place that was going to be spared. We could have just walked away, in fact I was going to because I am a horrible selfish person. But Chloe she can't, because her big secret is she actually gives a shit about things."

Max is holding the band around her right wrist tighter. Its almost as if she's trying to remind herself that version Chloe was real, as real as her self, as real as Clare as real as the one that died on the bathroom floor.

"She didn't want her mom, her step-dad, my friends or anyone to suffer or die if they didn't have to," Max explained. "She, she, begged me. Couldn't deny her, love her too much. We shared our second kiss, it was more passionate than our first and contained everything I needed to know about our growing…. Fuck it you know what we were soul mates, all the promise and love in our second and last kiss proved that. Then I traveled back in time to let her die on the cold tiles of a girls bathroom. My only comfort is that perhaps she heard me cry for her and realised she, she was loved."

"Thank you for sharing this with me even though its from day five," Clare said.

"Don't consider it day five," Max explained. "Day one au, au is for asshole universe as in the universe is an asshole."

"How so?"

"Everything that wasn't related to time travel from the week," Max explained. "The disappearance of Chloe's other friend, The threat to my classmate Victoria Chase, the circumstances of Kate Marsh's out of character behaviour and just Nathan Prescott in general all resolved neat and tidy because Chloe's death lead to Nathan's arrest and subsequent confession. The only thing that was the same was Kate and I on the roof on day two, we convinced each other not to jump off thank dog. So yeah the universe is an asshole because its gives me time travel powers and then shows me the best solution was not to use them and let the love of my life die."

Clare just stared dumbfounded.

"At least, at least with Edith her death saved an entire civilization," Max said. "All Chloe saved was a bunch of smart ass kids who didn't know what they were talking about and the third best greasy spoon on the west coast of the united states."

"Chloe had much more agency than Edith though," Clare said. "In fact she reminds me a bit of a friend I lost but never actually met, nor did she ever actually exist."

"Huh?"

"You'll see," Clare said with a warm smile. "Clare to Ranjea and Garcia."

"Clare what time is it?" Yawned Teresea Garcia from the other end of the comm channel.

"What can I do for you Clare?" Ranjea asked, several other deltan voices could be heard in the background.

"I'm with Max at the moment," Clare said. "Would you care to transport over I'd like you to talk to her about Shelan? I think it will help her with some stuff."

"Give me ten and I'll be there," Garcia said.

"I shouldn't be longer than that." Ranjea stated.

* * *

Clare worked at Max's desktop terminal while her colleagues explained about Shelan a Suliban agent of the DTI that only they could remember due to being outside the universe when the interdiction that had erased her from history had occurred. About how her final act had bought down a perpetual thorn in the side of all agencies protecting the time stream. About how she still mattered as her influence on them still influenced their interactions with others. Once Clare finished what she was doing and saw Max was still despondent.

"Ultimately what were trying to say is that your time with Chloe mattered," Clare explained. "For example are there any friends you wouldn't have made if not for your experience during your time travel week."

"Victoria Chase and Taylor… you know I can't remember Taylor's last name."

"Okay so Victoria Chase," Clare said. "Gallery owner that promoted new up and comers, biggest name she worked with one Max Caulfield on the 'Maximum Victory' series of photographs featuring triumphant survivors who had overcome just about everything and anything. Gave up all her worldly possessions at the start of world war 3 to provide aid to victims and then followed well know humanitarian Kate Marsh into the regions called the post atomic horror in order to assist her. Taylor Christensen, responsible to gaining many anti-radiation treatments being added to the first trade deals with the Vulcans."

"So they might have went on to do those things without knowing me."

"Then look at this," Clare said and turned the terminal towards Max.

An archival video started playing.

"Thanks man thought it'd be another week before we heard from anybody," an older man said as he was helped away from the debris.

"How many others are down there?" asked the camera man.

"Sixty."

"We heard about this place from the other bunkers," the camera man said. "Why isn't it listed when its so big?"

"It's the Darkroom," the survivor said.

"That's just a legend," said the female reporter.

"Hey its real," he said. "I thought it was gone for good until Max Caulfield started digging it up. I had to ask her why she was digging it up I mean she was a Blackhell survivor to. She said something about she had to or it would dishonor Chloe, she was the girl whose death exposed it all you know. Now put down that camera and help me get everyone else out."

"Okay Okay," the camera man said.

"One more question," the reporter said. "Now that you've survived the Apocalypse what do you think the future holds."

"First I needed to find Max, she gave up her place for a few more kids and nobody knows were she is, second I'm going to refill this hole because I'd be dishonoring Chloe, Rachel, Kate, Victoria and a whole heap of other people otherwise."

"Thanks Trevor," Max said to the screen.

"You see Chloe, the Chloe who had that entire extra week to grow with you, lives on in you. Just as Shelan lives on in Teresea and Ranjea, just as the memory of Edith Keeler and her ideals influenced the rest of Kirk's career and life."

"Still sucks I had to make a choice like that though," Max said.

"No argument there," Clare agreed.

Downtime: Whoa

"Welcome to the late Cretaceous," Ducane said as Chloe looked out at the earth that was only just settling into the familiar land mass patterns she knew. "This is the last time jaunt this ship will make so we thought we'd make it an interesting one."

"Whoa," every Chloe, except for Chloe, said as they observed a planet that had familiar coast lines that nether the less where slightly off what they should have been.

"So is this D-day for the Dinosaurs?" Shaka Brah asked.

"About a decade or two before then," The admiral explained. "Anyway we finally got permission to use our time travel drive to study one of the galaxies biggest mysteries, Did the dinosaurs have space flight capabilities?"

"What?" Chloe blurted. "Rachel said the same shit while she was super high once and just clicking random on wikipedia. You cannot be serious."

"My time period has long had a strained, but for the most part peaceful, relationship with a species called the Voth," The Admiral explained. "DNA evidence suggest they had a common ancestor to most hadrosaurs. But how could that be when they were first encountered on the other side of the galaxy?"

"They escaped the extinction event some how?" Vanilla asked. "And then their civilisation got buried so there is no fossil record?"

"Yes," he replied. "And we're here to find out the how they escaped and maybe get a start on the lack of fossil record."

"Daniels to Ducane," came the chirp on the Admiral's communication badge.

"Go ahead," the Admiral said as he tapped it.

"We're getting a scan blackout in the North American continent," he said. "It has a federation signature attached a JN..."

"Remarkable," the Admiral said. "Its related to DTI file MD978-476-8259-1, the computer will confirm, as for you Daniels sorry temporal prime directive applies."

"Wait what?" Stormy asked. "I thought Daniels was from further in the future than you?"

"Ah but the time traveler underneath that scan dead zone is from his own future and agencies assisting her are from even further ahead. You see we all get subjected to a secretive future in this line of business. Believe me the most frustrating thing is being the local talent for some uptime agency that won't and can't give you all the answers, for example some of things I have done for Daniel's agency in its future."

"So this is a tiny bit of revenge?" Chloe asked. "I can get behind that dude."

"Anyway moving on," he said. "While the Voth's distant origin theory is general accepted their method of leaving earth is still up for debate. I'm a fan of left under their own power but the current theory with more sway is rescued by a coalition of races initially created by the progenitors of humanoid life know as the Preservers."

While the other Chloe's looked at the interesting incoming visuals of the early Voth people Stormy hung back. The admiral was right, yeah the whole intelligent dinosaurs surviving thing was mind blowing and showed how cool time travel could be. But what was more mind blowing was that people from further uptime were restricted by the temporal prime directive as she was. She sighed and decided to contemplate that later. For now she went over to sit by Amber who seemed to be angrily staring at what was possibly a Voth emoji.


	10. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

Now: Name Day

"Come on Clare," Garcia said as she poked her head into Clare's office. "The Big guys need an update."

"Oh Dulmer is back from vacation?" Clare asked. "Lucksly is going to be happy to get back out into the field."

"Apparently he can't yet," Garcia said as Clare joined her. "I think Max scares him."

"He shouldn't be," Clare complained. "Even if Max did regain her time travel abilities, she got burned badly the first time."

"Hasn't stopped others before."

Clare nodded in reply.

"Its probably the implication that some one could traverse the time stream at will that concerns him most," Ranjea said as he joined them.

"So the Q, the traveller and a few others can," Garcia replied.

"Ah but they have evolved or earned those abilities," Ranjea stated. "But when you consider our uptime allies and adversaries?"

"They still utilise identifiable technology," Garcia said with a nod. "Technology we can deactivate."

"Where as how do we deactivate a naturally occurring ability in some one who isn't suppose to naturally have them?"

"Hopefully we never have to find out," Clare said as they entered the Directors office.

Director Dulmer was back after his annual family vacation, finally letting Deputy Director Lucksly get back to what he was best at. And what he was best at was worrying about threats to the time stream. Apparently he was worried enough about Max to sit in to offer his advice to Dulmer his long time friend.

"So a time displacee who was already a time traveler?" Dulmer asked knowing that his agents would give the best update possible.

"Our readings do confirm that," Ranjea said. "In fact it was possibly the Chroniton residue from Max's previous adventures in the time stream that saved her from the Nuclear blast in 2053."

"We also believe that was what shielded several structures that should have at least been damaged at the time," Garcia added.

"The data gathered by the children who found Max confirms her upstream time travel," Ranjea continued. "Our own readings with our temporal attuned tricorders showed the curve right were she arrived. We believe that the reason she arrived in our particular time frame is simple that is were the energy from the explosion ran out."

"Right so Max's abilities?" Dulmer asked.

"Temporal Inversion and Mental Temporal displacement," Garcia said. "Commander Peterson has actually refined our scanning protocols enough to differentiate between the two, she's currently on ESD getting some of the more sensitive sensors turned onto Arcadia bay."

"And the difference?"

"A matter of how the energy is utilised," Garcia said. "Her rewind, the temporal inversion, can probably only allow her to travel back forty-five minutes or an hour at most, but includes a quantum teleportation effect. Basically it means she stays were ever she initiated the time travel from rather than snap back to her original spatial location at the point she travels back to. Her other ability is able to transmit the current quantum state of her mind into her past self over vaster temporal distances."

"Not unlike the difference between a phaser set to wide beam and one set for a sniper shot on stun," Ranjea said. "In any case Max needs an object to focus on in order to achieve the second ability and her memory of the time she is aiming for seems to be affect her ability to interact with the time period. The details of the one incident she shared with us was that she was unable to move beyond the ground floor of a two level building and was unable to leave the building."

"I know more about this ability but am unable to discuss it at this time," Clare added.

"Ah of course Clare," Dulmer said with a nod. "So how is this Max coping with her temporal displacement?"

"Really, really well," Clare said with a smile. "Partially thanks to the fact she's an artist and thanks to the structure of our society she doesn't have to worry about funding any more. In fact last time we talked she joked that now she had artist as a fall back career. She's already made some friends in this time frame as well so that is going to be a big help. The rest though, I'm going to have to help her find the right kind of help for her other pre-existing issues."

Dulmer nodded. "Right I think there's nothing really more we can do then, maybe see if we can get Ms. Caulfield agree to some precautionary surveillance for a few months just in case. Right Garcia and Ranjea finish and file your reports then head up to ESD. The Everett came back in this morning they think they found where Spock activated the Red Matter device and its giving off some crazy readings. Readings that seem to fall in our wheelhouse."

While the agents left Clare stayed.

"Is there anything else Counselor Raymond?" Lucksly asked.

"Just I think Max may have used the polariod time travel more than she has told us," Clare stated. "There is still a period during her early misadventures she won't talk about, even though finally being able to talk about the event at all has been a relief to her."

"I'm sensing something more?" Dulmer prodded.

"A worrying reaction," Clare said. "Anthropomorphism of the Time stream, we have about fifty files were that was a bad sign, and in five of them it was a very bad sign."

"You'll find a way Clare," Lucksly encouraged her both Dulmer and Clare were surprised. "In fact I was once told you were the best person we have in this time frame for these kind of things."

"I'm sure Maxine is…."

"Director you just gave me an idea!" Clare exclaimed. "She hates been called Maxine, thank you."

She got up and hurried out.

Dulmer turned and raised his eyebrows at his long time partner and trusted friend.

"Technical he didn't break any rules," came the female voice from the woman who had appeared on one of the vacated seats.

"Hello Jena Noi," Dulmer said with a grumble. "What can we do for our friends from the thirty first century today?"

"Oh I'm just popping into say hi," she said. "Although I'll be around for awhile, Hobus left many scars, thought I might be polite and have any run ins with each other be in order for the next little while."

"So people from your time are still trying to restore the Eisn system?" Lucksly asked.

"I wish there was a way we could," Dulmer said earning him a stern look from Lucksly. "All those innocent lives."

"There will be one successful attempted," Jena admitted. "But a Romulus that is completely Borg isn't a pretty sight, thank the great bird that got corrected quickly."

Dulmer swallowed remembering his last encounter with the Borg in a distant future on a nature preserve, zoological ring world. Talk about irresponsible use of time travel and irresponsible in general. Who in their right mind would keep the Borg next to such a dangerous predator as a T-rex?

"Any opinion on Max then?" Dulmer asked to change the subject.

"Just be patient," she said. "Like I've told you and Lucksly before Clare knows what she is doing."

* * *

"Good morning Maxine," Clare said as she was joined by Max looking out over the water towards the golden gate bridge.

"Max, never Maxine," Max grumbled.

"And why is that Maxine?"

"I don't know just always liked it better."

"Maybe because Chloe started calling you Max first Maxine."

"No my parents said I was insisted on it when I was very young, well before Chloe and I official met and became friends."

"Oh but the other story would be so much cuter Maxine."

"Clare what the hell?"

"I'm just using your name Maxine Caulfield."

"That's not my name, it was once but it isn't any more."

"Then why do you still respond to it Maxine Caulfield?"

"Just don't...please..."

"To bad Maxine, I'm going to keep calling you Maxine until you give me a good reason not to call you Maxine."

"Oh you fucking bitch," Max said seething. "Fine you want to know why? Its because I met Maxine."

"But you're Maxine."

Max shook her head, "Day 5! I tried to tear reality a new one and I meet that bitch and I hate her!"

Uptime: No emoji

"Can't believe they were breeding the feathers off such beautiful creatures," Stormy complained to Vanilla as they walked the ships unrestricted corridors.

"Makes sense though," Vanilla replied as they turned another corner. "I mean obviously the Admiral didn't expect their ark ships to be as primitive as they were, obviously the Voth thought scales would be easier to keep clean and healthy in such cramped conditions."

"But wouldn't feathers be easier to keep out of the air filters on the life support and such?"

"Hmmm."

"So Shaka said you and her might be integrating soon?"

"Maybe," Vanilla replied. "But she wants it so I'm dominant."

"But she is closer to this time line wouldn't she be..."

"Apparently they have a technique but it hurts, like a lot, like a hella lot."

"So?"

"I'll do it and I'll relish the pain."

"Someone is a sensation Junkie," Stormy said. "Can't say I blame you after what Max told me after she saved me from ending up like Amber."

"Going to wait until Max catches up to us though."

"Why?"

"One of us has to have the courage to initiate the first kiss," Vanilla said. "Might as well be me."

"Hey I, we initiated that kiss."

"Giving her a dare you didn't expect her to do doesn't count."

"I was still hoping she'd do it."

"Still doesn't count chicken," Vanilla said poking her tongue out at her quantum sister. "So why didn't Max tell you about me until after Amber?"

"Because she had to...she had to use the same time travel that led to you," Stormy explained. "She'd sworn off it after what happened."

"Understandable," Vanilla said with a solemn nod.

"Let me start at the beginning at least from my view of events," Stormy said. "Max and I heading to the vortex party looking for trouble, we bump into Warren outside."

"Warren?"

"Yeah Max's Best Bro forever and thanks to his awesomeness at an earlier time, potential contributor to Price-Caulfield offspring."

"Ew."

"Anyway Max lets the young man borrow her camera and he succeeds in taking the worst selfie of 2013," Stormy explained. "Then Max started acting weird."

"Future Max?"

"Yeaup," Stormy replied. "And she's begging me or rather us if you include present Max not to go into the party, she managed to convince me. As soon as we move away present Max was back. I explained about the warning and we went home. Told Step-douc… Sorry David about our Castle style clue board and he made the connection we couldn't."

"Once that was done Max explained to me how dire the future situation was if she took such a big risk. How she didn't remember being future Max and how future Max wouldn't remember being her. Here's the thing I think Max might have already made one attempt before that though."

"What makes you say that?"

"Phony's memories," Stormy explained while she tapped the side of her head. "She remembers some one giving David a warning about Jeffershit and he got arrested. Most of the rest played out relatively the same, accept she and Max co-operated with the authorities. They thought the storm wouldn't come though, until it did. So anyway back in my version of reality Max and I talked through the night, she wasn't sure if the Max she was at that point was just a place holder for the real Max or an alternate version she would force out."

"Sounds like a conversation we'll have to have with her again if she doesn't remember it."

"Yeah," Stormy said. "Anyhow Max collapsed at roughly the time she would have time travelled to save Phony because I now know it took place about five minutes after the phone conversation they had."

"So Max came back from her time travel then?"

"No that's just it she didn't," Stormy explained. "She got up and said we should go to the Lighthouse but she wasn't, wasn't in there in any form. No emoji Max I called her in that state."

"But she did eventually comeback though right?"

"Of course," Stormy said. "But all the way to the lighthouse it was like she was acting something out. Then she had a heated argument with herself about using her time travel powers. I hope what I said helped her at the time. A little after that it was like she woke up and most definitely real Max was back. I just hope she forgives me for asking her for asking her to give me up again."

"At least your reasons weren't selfish like mine," Vanilla mumbled.

"Ah enough of this we should really get back to Amber and see how that ensign we coerced into looking after her is doing," Stormy said.

"I was looking up some stuff about Ensign Sterin's people last night," Vanilla said as they turned to go back to their rooms. "You know the Vulcans never developed emoji's or emoticons."


	11. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10: Maxine probably had the Pancakes on day 2  
**

Now: Take a mental health day

"The thing is she hates me back," Max explained. "Hates me for even trying to save Chloe, trying to use my abilities to make life better even if it was just in a small portion of Arcadia bay. I hate the fact the bitch had a point."

"And Maxine is a version of you from an alternate time line?" Clare asked.

"At the time I thought maybe she was," Max explained. "Maybe she was the Max from the timeline were Chloe was Quadriplegic, ticked off at me for dropping into her nice cosy life and leaving her facing murder charges, but as I grew older I wasn't so sure. When I look in a mirror sometimes its not me looking back, it's her."

"And when did you meet Maxine?"

"Day Five as I was snapping back after my final polaroid time trip."

"I got the impression you didn't do that after what happened to Chloe on day three."

"I wouldn't have either except at the start of Day Five everything went wrong, and I, I..."

"Go on Max."

"I couldn't rewind to save Chloe and I might have gotten Victoria Chase killed," Max said. "I told you about a teacher I hated right?"

"Um yes," Clare said looking at her notes. "You mentioned something about when your abilities became apparent he obstructed you from returning to the girls bathroom."

"Reasons number 1. for the hate, he murdered Chloe, reason number 2. he drugged me so I couldn't rewind to save Chloe. Reason number 3 the death of Rachel Amber. Reason number 5 Nathan's sad fate in most realities I have seen. Reason number 6 through thirty is just a list of girls he took to his Dark Room. Kate Marsh is number 6, Victoria Chase is at 7 and..."

"And you are on that list aren't you?"

"Number thirty," Max admitted. "Because I, I was able to use my time travel to escape before he violated me like the others. No wait...make it so he hadn't, he had but I made it so he hadn't, Reason number 31 was the fact he made me responsible for Victoria being there the first time around. I told her to go to someone she trusted because I was worried about Nathan doing something to her. She actually took my advice and it might have got her killed. I hope to dog I was wrong and he had merely given her something stronger and she was still alive. Not like I could check being tied up and all."

"You said first time around?" Clare questioned.

"I ended up there again but not before it looked like everything had finally gone right," Max explained. "You see I used a couple of photo based time jumps to get myself all the way back to day one. I felt so strong, powerful even," Max said. "Now I don't know exactly what happened after I managed to get that ass hole off my back about the damn unimportant photo contest and get the warning out about him but when I snapped back I was on a plane to San Francisco."

"That seems like a big change."

"Turned out I won the contest," Max said with a smile devoid of emotion. "But instead of the intended chaperone I was been accompanied by the school's principal. A man who at the worst was incompetent, ineffectual and negligent rather than out and out evil."

"So you changed the timeline again?" Clare asked.

"Yeah thought that might be the end of it," Max said. "In retrospect I should have checked to see if the weather events had still occurred, and with even greater hindsight I should have realised something was going wrong when I didn't remember anything happening between the plane and the gallery."

"I take it this was one timeline before Chloe sacrificed herself?"

"Two actually," Max elaborated. "Everything was great, I was enjoying the art, being weirded out by having my work enlarged to epic proportions and then I had a vision, the storm, I found out Chloe had been trying to get in contact with me I called her back. I hadn't solved the bigger problems the week had presented me with. The storm was bearing down on Arcadia Bay and I had no choice but to change time again. I managed to use the contest photo to jump back to the day I took it. Except the space I was able to move in was much smaller than it was previously. Was it because it wasn't a memorable time for me or was it because I was taxing my powers? I don't know."

"Hmmm."

"Anyway I tore it apart, such a small act, but it changed history again." Max said. "And landed me right back in the Dark room. Thankfully Victoria wasn't there this time, but that was because I had really pissed him off in this timeline so I had his entire focus."

"And how did you do that?"

"By tearing up that photo," Max explained. "Wasting my talent. Reason I hate him forty-seven, he burnt my favourite photo of Chloe. That is what he did, burnt all the photo's that had survived my time adventures by never leaving my side. No escape through a picture for Max that time. I was saved though, Chloe's step dad, he found our clue board. Had to rewind several times before David was able to subdue that asshole, then I had to lie to David about what that asshole did to Chloe so he wouldn't do something he'd regret. Turns out in that version I probably got Nathan Prescott killed judging by the panicked voice mail he left me."

"So in this version there wasn't a Chloe but no storm either?" Clare asked.

"Oh no the Storm was coming," she said. "I borrowed the asshole's car and headed into it as I only had one option left to save Chloe. My friend Warren had taken the worst photograph ever but it had me and Chloe in it. Of course I had to ditch the car and navigate a storm ravaged town on foot. Screwed up a few times got people killed, lucky me I can use my time travel like a horrible version of you transporters. Get a guy killed as I move past an obstacle, rewind he's okay and I'm still past the obstacle. Saved some of my stupid friends, well Evan was stupid, the universe just has this weird petty thing about Alyssa. Found my boy Warren hunkered down in the Two Whales, he kept the photo thank dog, boy got an awkward Max hug every time I saw him after that."  
"So you jump back and warn Chloe?" Clare asks.

"Yep and as I was snapping back I felt her grabbing my hand felt her dragging me away," Max sighed. "It felt good to have Chloe trust me like that again."

"I'm sensing you didn't snap back as normal?"

"No it was like I was back at the start of the entire mess," Max explained. "But everything was wrong, every thing in that room was against me even, even Kate's desk, the writing, accusing me of doing the wrong thing by helping her. Then he appeared to stop me leaving, I couldn't say what I really wanted, In the end the best I could say was my selfies were shit but that seemed to appease whatever he was. I leave but now I'm in the dormitories, I see Kate she's accusing me of making the wrong choice again. I don't know but I manage to navigate the same hallway several times and end up back in the school corridor from the first day but time is not running the same for everyone. Then that god damn ghost deer shows up."

"Ghost Deer?" Clare asks.

"I kept seeing this damn doe every where that week," Max said. "Got a photo of it once but it wasn't actually there. I follow it into the girls bathroom and this is were things get nuts!"

"Uh-uh."  
"It was a maze composed of several places I had been to that week with people hunting for me with flash-lights, Twisted versions of my friends, authority figures and him, always him. Deep down inside myself did I real fear Warren was like that, had my recent experience made me decide that I couldn't trust anyone with the slightest hint of authority. Apparently the lighthouse was the end point but when I got there I was forced to watch the day Chloe's dad died again. That's when the parade of false Chloes started. My worst fears about my actions that week, mixing in with my anxieties about our developing relationship. I honestly don't know how I got through that but I did. That's when I met Maxine."

"Keep going."

"It was the diner," Max explained. "Literally everyone I had encountered during the week was there, no one was moving, except for the person sitting in my favourite booth, myself, Maxine."

"I take it you talked?" Clare asked.

"Yeah…." Max said tiredly. "Yeah about my powers, about Chloe using me. She was second guessing everything and despite me trying to argue with her she was wearing me down enough that I might have started agreeing with her but my everyday hero showed up to save me."

"Chloe?" Clare guessed.

"It was kind of awesome," Max said with a sigh. "The thing is I think it actually was Chloe defending my actions, not just a figment of my imagination. That, that was the one positive experience of Day five, it almost made the rest of it worth it. Heh, whenever I lack confidence I still imagine Chloe busting in and cheering me on just like she did then. But then I woke up and now Chloe is gone and Maxine is still in here somewhere, no matter how hard I've tried to kill her off."

"How exactly did you try to go about that?"

"First I changed my legal name to Max Pricefield in the early 2030s," Max explained. "Then I tried to show other people she was there with my poorly received selfie photo series, Loathing, people got I was trying to work out some stuff but no one came close to getting what. Then there was the meditation, yoga, colouring book mindfulness, various religions and every fad to help with mental well being until I picked up a shovel so some more people could survive the apocalypse. Strangely the shoveling made her shut up and keep out of my mind the most. So that's it you now have the whole story about the week that was both the best and second worse week of my life now counselor what's your diagnosis?"

Clare leaned back on the bench and smelt the air. She was sure about it. Max had crossed over her own time travel several times in such a short span. Add that to the other issues that Max already had and the brand new ones she probably gained during that time. Clare was sure about it but was still hesitant to say it out loud. She sighed, some one was going to have to put the first chronologically know case on the books sometime and it looked like it was her responsibility.

"You had an episode of Temporal Psychosis."

"Temporal what?"  
"Temporal Psychosis," Clare explained. "Is basically a kind of mental break down exacerbated by performing multiple time jumps in a short span of objective time. In your case a day. Hallucinations are are a common symptom, anxiety and paranoia of course and then attributing success or failure to either the time stream itself or some other factor. Although congratulations Max you're the first know case to direct that blame inward, although if Maxine had her way you might have started to blame Chloe."

"I...I could never do that."

"Any way now that we know the whole picture we can start figuring out the best way way to proceed with your on going mental health treatment," Clare said. "Although I do have one recommendation in order to avoid another temporal psychosis episode."

"What's that?"

"Never attend an event were you might run into an Admiral Kathryn Janeway. She and time travel do strange things to each other."

Uptime:Chloe sucks at gun safety

"You can use this ship to save them," Amber shouted as she brandished the ray gun in the Admiral's face.

"I can't," the Admiral said as he shook his head to warn Daniels off.

"You can take us back we can stop Jeffershit from drugging her," Amber said. "Then we can jump back a few months and beam Rachel out of the party before Nathan even gets to her."

Chloe, Stormy and Vanilla all burst through the mess halls doors to be confronted with their other self threatening their host.

"Chloe they can help us save Rachel and they don't want to," Amber said as she noticed her other selves had joined them.

"Don't Chloe," Vanilla warned. "Look at me, Max tried this once and it nearly destroyed her."

"Amber Max is safe," Stormy tried. "She's stronger than us remember, she escaped and saved us again."

"Then why isn't she here?" Amber wailed and then refocused on Ducane. "Take me to Max now, I don't even care about Rachel any more just take me to my Max."

That set Chloe off and she tackled Amber to the ground.

"Rachel is important to me and she should be to you," she said as she shook her other self.

That was when Doctor Graham wander in.

"It's time," she said.

"Then I'll get to the Bridge," the Admiral said. "And set a course."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later Shaka Brah came into the Mess hall after having a nice morning playing some holodeck games based on old movies.

"What's going on guys?" she asked when she noticed Chloe was brooding by the window, Amber crying on the floor, Vanilla slumped beneath the replicators and Stormy desperately searching a padd that listed illicit recreational substances. Eventually Stormy replied.

"You know, stuff."


	12. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11: Reunion**

Now: A happy day in Arcadia Bay

"Thanks for coming to our school Max," David said as the temporally displaced woman dug into yet another serving of Belgian Waffles at the Two Whales dinner.

"Hey it was no problem," Max said after she swallowed down her delicious breakfast treat. "It was nice and I'm glad some one acknowledged the work Ms. Grant did to turn it around. I feel like I'm falling further behind in science though, M'arshda is the age we would have called middle school back in the day but she's doing course work we wouldn't have touched until senior year high school. Then you and T'ler, you're doing calculations Warren and Brooke struggled with in college. Sorry for saying so but it makes me feel a little intellectually inadequate."

"But you surpass us in other ways," T'ler said. "For example your photography, the new work you shared with us in arts period, I would never be able to find such a diverse array of subjects at the Orion cultural festival, nor would I be able to pinpoint the exact time to capture the joy some one is feeling as she danced."

"You noticed that?" David asked her.

"Of course."

"My favourite of that lot," Max said with a smile. "Reminds me of one particular one I lost to the ravages of time."

"You must excuse David and myself Max," T'ler said as she stood and pulled her friend to his feet. "We have a group project to attend to."

"Yes we better get going before the rest of the group attempts to use the repulsor beam to send Pariese Squares mallets into orbit again."

M'arshda and Van joined Max at the table with their own milkshakes as they watched the others go.

"So have they been a thing long?" Max asked.

"Only since they were seven," Van explained. "And T'ler presented her father and grandparents with a logical twenty minute presentation on why she and David should perform the betrothal joining."

"Even though her family is from a provenance that never really practised it and its generally fallen out of favour in general," M'arshda explained. "Anyway I wanted to ask about the original statue? Where is it? And who pulled it down? And why?"

"Well we all deal with stuff and different ways," Max said. "You understand I was around the time everyone started calling the school Blackhell for a very good reason."

Both younger beings nodded.

"Well Justin, Trevor and Hayden found that the illicit substances they liked to partake in weren't helping them deal," Max explained. "I may have helped provide the vehicle they used in the destructive vandalism that didn't really help them either but it did provide a first step towards closure."

"What did they do to the statue?" Van asked.

"Maybe if you can find the lost time capsule you could find out for yourself," Max teased as she rose and pushed her plate away. "If you excuse me I have a little closure I have to work towards myself, see you around kids."

Max nodded to the Bolsic teen as she left through the door, it still felt strange not to leave a tip but if this version of the economy provided her with the best breakfast food and labelled it an essential she was fine with that.

* * *

It was a near perfect day in Arcadia Bay and Max was headed towards the lighthouse. She had started seeing a civilian counselor who had enough experience and security clearance to deal with Max's particular set of issues and she could now see Clare solely about adjusting to living in the future. So this was a start of a new period of her life and like always she was on her way to tell Chloe, just as she always had. Max grimaced a bit, perhaps an apology for not joining Chloe in the next life might be in order. She passed the turn to the old cemetery, the bodies had been moved sometime after the third world war and records as to where to had been lost before first contact. It didn't matter, in Max's mind Chloe was only there when Joyce and David needed her to be. No it was always the lighthouse where they connected, parted and reconnected. She had timed the walk just right and arrived at the bench at almost the exact same time as she and Chloe had that day so long ago now. A stray thought of getting the weather control service to make it snow popped into Max's head. It would be nice to experience that beauty without the other dangers.

"Hey Chloe," Max said as she sat down. "First let me just say I'm sorry I haven't joined you, but you know me always awkward and doing the wrong thing in new situations.

"I don't know Max," said a blonde haired Chloe who sat down beside her. "Not being blown up in a nuclear explosion seems like the right move to me."

"Chloe!?"

"Saved me again Max," she said with a smile.

"What? How? Your hair?"

Chloe could see that Max was panicking so she lent in and kissed her on the lips. And its was awkward and sweet and wonderful and perfect just like the first one. Although this time it was Max who pulled back in surprise.

As Max pulled away Chloe managed to manoeuvre Max's camera into selfie position and press the smaller woman's finger onto the button. The camera flashed.

"Photobomb!" cried the blue haired Chloe that popped up from behind the bench.

"I've died," Max said. "That's the only explanation, now is this my version of heaven or hell?"

"You're not dead yet Max-imum Warp," the Blue haired Chloe said as she sat down on the other side of Max.

"In fact thanks to you none of us Chloes are dead," The blonde explained.

"What?"

"First let me thank you Max," The blonde said. "For going back and trying to make my life better by saving Dad."

"You're…? But I….the…?"

"That wasn't your fault."

"But I did with the morphine, I..."

"Yes," she said. "And don't let anyone ever tell you that was the wrong choice."

"But I was sure you had, I was sure you were gone before I left," Max stated on the verge of tears, both happy and sad.

"What can I say 29th century medicine is a lot better than the crummy 24th century medicine you've had to put up with."

"I don't understand," Max admitted.

"Just understand Max that you came through for us again," the Blue haired Chloe said. "But right now another Chloe is trapped in the darkest place in her life."

"She needs to see that our Max is safe," The blonde Chloe explained.

"But more importantly you have to forgive her for failing you," Blue hair said.

"You've never failed me," Max insisted.

"Don't lie Max," Both Chloes said at once.

"After that maybe you can see about giving us a proper reunion," Blue haired said.

Blonde Chloe pulled a civilian communicator out of her pocket.

"Three to beam up Admiral."

All three women disappeared in the a haze of light.


	13. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12: Haunted by Rachel Amber**

Now: The Ship from the Future's Future's

Max and the two Chloe's materialised on the transporter padd.

"Welcome back," said the grey haired human at the console. "And this must be Max."

"Uh hi," Max squeaked.

"Indeed she is."

"Welcome aboard the..." he began. "Sorry I just realised I can't tell you the name of the ship."

"Uh Why?" asked the blue haired Chloe.

"Temporal Prime directive," Blonde Chloe guessed.

"Whatever," the bluenette said. "Is Amber still in sick bay?"

"You found a way to save Rachel?" a confused Max asked.

The blue haired Chloe looked away for a moment.

"No Max we haven't," she said sadly. "But you know me always the nicknamer and it kind of comes in handy when there is more than one of me running about."

"I still think we should call Shaka here smoochy mcsmooch face."

"Shut it Vanilla."

"Wait if Amber is another Chloe…." Max pondered aloud. "You should take me to her right now."

"I'd be happy to escort you Max."

"And you were?"

"Admiral Ducane," he said. "Come I believe Vanilla and Shaka have something they need to do before they catch up."

* * *

The admiral guided Max through the halls of the ship. She thought she saw two more Chloes staring at her from a hall way that intersected the one she was following. Eventually the Admiral lead her to some doors that opened up to a room very similar to the medical ward Max had awoke in not to long ago. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the woman with blue hair who occupied one of the beds. She seemed to be crying in her sleep. Max hurried over forgetting all about the admiral.

"Chloe I'm here," she said. "I'm safe and so are you."

"Go away dream Max," this Chloe groaned still half asleep.

"Chloe you know I was actually trying to keep you away from guns," Max admitted. "I was always worried that they'd get you hurt when combined with your gun ho attitude."

"Really dream Max?"

"Ugh sorry," Max apologised. "But its the truth, I was worried about stuff escalating when we confronted Frank or Nathan so I might have rewound once or twice to keep the gun out of your hands."

"Fat lot of good it did us me having it anyway."

"Chloe you didn't fail me," Max said. "I'm the one that failed you, the asshole drugged me. I wasn't strong enough to fight it, wasn't strong enough to use my rewind to save you. The last thing I saw before I passed out was the girl who is so much more than my best friend doing her best to protect me."

"You're leaving something out Max!" the accusation almost seemed to physically hurt Max.

"No I'm not!"

"The fact that I went down like a punk," she said quietly.

"No that's not..."

"Don't lie Max."

"Okay you did," Max said. "But if I was in your position I would have to, so would have Rachel, so would have Frank, heck even David would have I think. In fact he did a few times when he saved me later. That was the kind of person we were dealing with."

Max sighed.

"Chloe I forgive you," Max said. "But only if you forgive me. Now come over here and give me a hug."

"Okay dream Max but if you fade away again like you did last time I'm going to be mad again."

Chloe wrapped here arms around Max and Max did the same to her blue haired friend. Happy tears began to flow down Chloe's face.

"You're...you're actually here," she said. "I guess the others weren't lying. Can we stay like this for a little while I still can't believe this that you're here."

"You can't believe it!?" Max said. "Think how I'm feeling, I think I have to live another lifetime without you, because of another god damn time travel incident, and now there a several of you."

"Don't blame us for that," said the blonde Chloe as she entered the room with a different blue haired Chloe from before. "You must have gotten very good at saving us over that week."

"Where's the other one?" Max asked.

"Here," the Blonde said holding up her hand.

"What?"

"Shaka brah and Vanilla reintegrated," the blue haired one said. "We think the universe should probably only deal with one of me at a time."

"Wait Shaka..." Max whispered. "First Chloe let me apologise its just you were teasing me about erasing it and I hadn't even rewound yet and I..."

"Anyone ever tell you you're cute when you're nervous Caulfield," the Chloe in her arms said.

"I have 48 Max kisses now."

"Quality over Quantity Vanilla," The other Chloe said with a massive satisfied smile on her features.

Max blushed when she realised when the other Chloe was from.

"Are you ready Amber?" that Chloe asked.

"I think so Stormy," she said as she finally left Max's arms. "But are you sure, I mean I have more issues than damsel or phoney."

"Your issues are my issues."

"Ummm..."

"Come on Max there is one more of me you have to reconnect with," Vanilla said as she grabbed Max's hand.


	14. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13: Reunion**

Now: Reconnecting

The door opened to reveal a Chloe staring at the beautiful earth below. Obviously she was looking for Arcadia bay as the west coast of the north American continent was in view. There was another thing that was obvious to Max. This was both the first and the last Chloe. The one that had died on the bathroom floor not knowing how close Max was to her at the time. The one she had both torn time asunder to save and the one she could only cry for in the end after everything.

"Chloe I'm sorry."

"For what Caulfield."

"For starters leaving you when you needed me most," Max said sadly. "Not calling you everyday until you were, well not okay again, but at least able to deal. Second for not coming back to Arcadia bay every summer, every holiday I missed, every time you needed a hug and I wasn't there to give you one. Third I'm sorry for not coming to your place and knocking on your door the day I got back into Arcadia bay, no the very moment I got back."

"Whoa Max slow down," Chloe said as she turned to finally look at her estranged friend. "You're starting to tear up there."

"Don't care," Max said. "I've waited so long to tell you all this. I'm sorry I never got to convince you to stay in school, I'm sorry I never got to be jealous of your new friends, I'm sorry I was never there when you needed to bitch about your step dad."

"Starting to get into things you don't know about there Max Headroom," Chloe said unsure of what to do.

"I'm a time traveler Chloe I know lots of things I shouldn't," Max said. "Like the fact you were trying to blackmail Nathan because he drugged you."

"That's not true..."

"I know he pulled a gun on you," Max said. "And this brings me to what I'm most sorry for."

"And what's that Max?"

"For not saving you the first time around," Max explained. "And for not finding another way the last time around. For not being able to do anything but cry for my friend that was about to die on the bathroom floor."  
"That was you?" Chloe asked in disbelieve.

"Yes," Max said. "Now shut up and let me hug you, because I'm never making the mistake of losing you for any reason again."

"But I," Chloe swallowed nervously. "I was such a bitch to you before you left I was sure you'd never want to speak to me again. Everyday since then I've been moving between hating you, missing you, wanting to take my truck to Seattle to yell at you or just see you."

"That truck wouldn't have made it," Max said. "In fact it didn't the one time I tried it."

"You've been driving my baby Max! Now I'm I'm not sure if I can forgive you at all."

"Shut up you know you love me."

The two long lost friends embraced each other as their home planet continued to revolve just outside the window.


	15. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14: Catching up  
**

Now: Just talking  


"Did you ever come close to telling her how you felt?" Max asked Chloe.

"Maybe once," Chloe replied. "While we were making our L.A. plans I almost went a little to far into what I was actually hoping to get out of it at the time. So you ever get a picture of yourself on top of the Space Needle?"

"Too much security," Max said. "And my Seattle friends never got why I wanted to do it, too local and their taste in television sucked occasionally."

"I couldn't watch that show after you left."

"Well I didn't watch any of the later Pirates of the Caribbean movies because I couldn't watch them with you, did you really throw some one through a window?"

"It was open at the time and he was drunk or high."

"Little of both from what I heard," Max said. "Why didn't you fight to stay in school?"

"Because I didn't fit there any more," Chloe sighed. "I got super annoyed at Rachel Amber for about a week after because she could fit anywhere and still be her and here I was Chloe who didn't even feel like she fit in her own family any more."

"I take it you felt Rachel was the one who could change to fit with you rather than the opposite?"

"Exactly."

"What was it like when Joyce first introduced you to David?"

"Confusing," Chloe admitted. "I was happy she was starting to fell happy, but I was mad that this guy wasn't Dad, angry at myself for not being the one to get my mother to that place were she could smile again and resentful and betrayed because I couldn't smile like that. Why come back to Arcadia Bay Max? I mean you know how much I went into debt so I could even have a chance of leaving."

"Well the school of course, at the time there was the added bonus of the teacher was acclaimed in the particular medium I work in, I missed the food from the two whales diner and most importantly I wanted to see you again."

"Really?"

"Yes dummy," Max said. "And before you ask I wrote several journal pages to try and give myself the courage to come see you, then I got worried about school things, my other issues and then I had this irrational fear that I had seen you and not recognised you and I would never able to do it right anyway."

"So if none of this weirdness happened how would you have tried to come back into my life?"

"Halloween night, I'd be in full pirate costume at your door at the very moment its appropriate to start trick or treating," Max said. "If I didn't get the courage to do that all you would have got was a letter saying how much I sucked and a few things I would have needed to tell you no matter what."

"I feel cheated by the universe now," Chloe said. "Could have been a good version of reality, please don't give me that look Max, I know even if you still could you wouldn't, the other mes have been pounding that into my head for a while now. Your face went dark when you mentioned the teacher you went to Blackwell for, wasn't what you thought it would be?"

"No," Max said. "Turned out the responsible adult was responsible for a lot of things."

"Can you tell me about it?"

"Chloe he was responsible for Rachel disappearing," Max said. "We found her remains, that's why that other you was like that. We found out he was directly or indirectly responsible for the bad things happening at Blackhell at the time. Other than whoever was buying directly from Frank and not through Nathan. Shit I better find out what happened to Frank."

"You knew Frank?"

"Not well," Max said. "I just ended up being the person he left Pompidou with when he left to try and turn his life around."

"Frank?"

"Chloe, Frank and Rachel had a thing, similar to what you and she had I suspect, closer maybe. I don't know because I never knew her. But you knew he sold drugs to the vortex snobs, Frank sold the stuff that Nathan used to drug her the night she went missing, the stuff he overdosed her with. All so he could take the same kind of sick pictures as his hero."

"He did that to her to..." Chloes voice trailed off.

"Its okay I know what happened," Max whispered.

"Where all those posters a waste of time though?" Chloe asked. "I mean I guess she was already gone gone the night she went missing."

"No they weren't," Max said. "I kept one after everything, helped your Mom take them down."

"Why'd you keep it?"

"Proof that Chloe Price actually gives a shit."

"No I don't."

"Says the girl who probably asked her hated step dad for money so she could photocopy more posters," Max said. "Says the girl who's determination to find her friend lead to said friends Killers, says the girl who would give up her life to save a town she says she hates."

"I'm nothing like Stormy."

"Yes you are," Max insisted. "Right after the Rust bucket was fixed you could have gone anywhere, heck you would have still made Portland until I loaned it to some people for reasons. But you didn't leave because you didn't want Frank looking to get the money out of Joyce or the diner or even David."

The Same time

"And Max is three for three on the Re-connecting with Chloe score," Vanilla said as she looked over Doctor Graham's shoulder.

"And you wonder why I always asked great Aunt Max for advice on relationships?"

"What was that?" Vanilla asked.

"Nothing," Doctor Graham said. "Now lets finish your last check up."

"Like we really need to," Vanilla snorted. "In five minutes Chloe will coming looking for me and Stormy so we can integrate."

"Hours," Dr. Graham said. "And its closer to six. Now get on that Biobed young lady I just want to confirm I'm the best damn Doctor in Starfleet.

Also at the Same time

"Thanks for the help Admiral," Stormy said. "Uh you haven't broken any rules to get Max for us have you?"

"Nope," he replied. "As long as I don't tell you what happens next I'm fulfilling my duties."

"What happens next?" Stormy asked herself more than the admiral. "Hopefully whatever it is I can face it with Max. I can stay here in the twenty-fourth century with her right?"

"Of course," the Admiral said. "You haven't seen anything on this ship that hasn't already been invented by this time period."

"Now I understand I don't really need to work due to your kooky government and economy," Stormy said. "But I should probably do something with me life, show I'm actually truly super grateful for the fourth and sixth chances Max has given me."

"You'll figure something out."

"Integrate first though," Stormy said. "Although if Max asks us to hold off for sexy fun times reasons well that could be arranged."

Again at the same time

"I was a complete and utter dunsel," Max said. "A complete mess of confused feelings so I just focused on school and photography because those made sense."

"What do you mean about confused feelings?"

"Most of them centered on you," Max said. "When I finally got some friends up there I tried to explain you to them, they started calling you my ex much to my annoyance."  
"Rachel called you something similar after we fought about you once."

"Any way what if it was actually that we broke up over something that was extremely important and extremely stupid at the same time?"

"Really?"

"Even discarding the week you haven't experienced," Max explained. "Our friendship is closer to that kind of relationship than anything else I've experienced."

"And discarding that week that never happened the next closest was?"

"Four of five months as something a little closer than friends with benefits with a very classy lady."

"Oh la la."

"We both knew it wouldn't last what with us being deeply in love with people we couldn't be with but we enjoyed it for what it was," Max said. "You'll love the story of the project we collaborated on, its hilarious, romantic and its why we stopped what we were doing together and lead to the creation of my third favourite surviving piece of work. I'll tell it to you sometime. Hey Chloe just girls or were there some boys you liked to? Remember I have seen your room."

"Guh that poster has caused me no end of trouble."

"Plus all your boyish clothes that still accentuates how female you are and..."

"I guess you could say I experimented with some of the guys I skated with," Chloe said. "But they didn't really do it for me, oh they could press the right buttons, but emotionally Rachel was the first to come close to what I needed...oh hell."

"What?"

"Maybe just maybe we were in a relationship and didn't realise it even after we unintentionally broke up."

Max passed something over to Chloe.

"Where did you get these?" Chloe asked. "The replicator has patterns but they're restricted."

"Oh these are natural got them from Trevor just before my latest time travel misadventure," Max explained. "Was going to share them with you in the afterlife."

"How do we know this isn't the afterlife?"

"Because this isn't a version of the two whales diner that is also a water park with Rachel Amber as a life guard and your mom with your dad on one arm and David on the other."

"What?"


	16. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15: Generating more paperwork for the DTI  
**

Now: Happy reintegration Day  


"So we just stand here."

"Yep."

"And after they work their magic I'll..."

"Remember everything we do."

"Maybe have some bad habits you don't have yet."

"Okay I'm ready."

"Energize," Admiral Ducane ordered.

Max watched fascinated as the three Chloes turned into glittering beams of light and merged on the transporter padd. After mere moments the beam solidified once again into a singular Chloe that fell into Max's arms.

"Oh ah," Chloe said. "Hey Max, umm thank you, its nice to know what umm I was talking about."

"Are you okay?" Max asked.

"Better than okay," Chloe said. "You did all this stuff for me, I want to kiss you but its still to early in our relationship. Your not weired out by that are you? Maybe we should like actually date first? Would you like to go on a date with me?"

"Yes and I understand about the kissing."

"I just give me time," Chloe realised what she said. "Sorry."

"Besides it'll be number fifty," Max said as seductively as she could. "It'll have to be very special."

Chloe actually blushed

"So what now?" Max asked their host.

"Now we transport you back and we get on our way," Ducane told them. "Well that is what the DTI file says."

"Probably should go there first," Max said. "They'll need to know another twenty-first century refugee will be starting a new life in this time frame. Can you put us down just outside of Clare's office?"

"That we can," Ducane said.

Max stepped up on the transporter Pad with Chloe.

"Thanks Admiral," Chloe said.

"See you some other time," Max said with a smirk.

Chloe's, "Really Max?" was droned out be the whine of the transporter.

* * *

"Come on Chloe," Max said as she materialised. "You know me, you know it could be worse."

"And I want to date you why?"

"Because you love me."

"Maybe."

Max pressed the chime on Clare's door.

"I'll be with you in a few minutes," Clare's voice called.

"No its okay," came another voice. "After all its important."

The door swished open and revealed a women that Max could only describe as exotic even in this world of diversity.

"Besides maybe I specifically came in today so I could meet them," Jena Noi said as she exited.

Surprisingly it was Chloe that blurted out something before she could say anything else.

"Temporal Prime directive young lady."

Max recognised something familiar when the women drew back in shock. The same haunted look she had seen in her reflection in the days without Chloe whenever Maxine wasn't harassing her. She drew the woman into a hug.

"I won't say it'll be okay because it won't, and it won't get easier but you live your life the best you can because they'd be disappointed in you otherwise."

"I just wish we could all be as lucky as you Max."

"Maybe one day we'll figure out how I got so lucky and we could save the rest without breaking time."

"Something to work towards," Jena said as Max let go she turned back to the doorway. "Thanks for the session Clare it helped as always."

"Any time Ms. Noi," Clare said as she approached the door. "Hello Max what can I do for you today?"

"Hi Clare umm I was wondering if you can organise a place fore Chloe here?"

"'Sup?" Chloe said as she stepped out from behind Max.

"We need to see the Big Guys now."

A few minutes later Max, Chloe and Clare were in the Directors office. Dulmer was sitting down massaging his temples and Lucksly was hovering over Chloe with his tricorder.

"So as far as they could tell," Chloe explained. "Whatever happened to Max had a shock wave that traveled back through her time travel and catapulted the various mes forward as well except if they didn't intercept me I would have stopped at the up time end of the shock wave."

Lucksly gave a nod to Dulmer. What readings he got from his tricorder did support what their up time colleagues had told Chloe.

"Oh and they said something about me being quantum duplicated due to micro something or other Max might make when she time travels but honestly I don't have a clue what that means."

"It means if we dug up your grave you are probably still there," Lucksly said.

"What?" Chloe and Max asked

"Forgive Lucksly's bluntness but he is essential right."

"Oh oh," Max said. "I think I get it, Chloe is like a stream split into two one continues on the path I saw and the other flows to the future."

"Not entirely accurate but a good enough analogy and we can save any philosophical discussions for a later date."

"So practical matters?" Clare asked. "I've already arranged housing for Chloe while we've been talking, I'm sorry I couldn't get you closer to Max dear but Seattle is only a transporter away from San Francisco."

"No that's fine," Chloe said. "I've always wanted to visit there and I might have a willing guide for the historical district."

"It'll have to wait until I decide if you get a second date I already have the first planned."

"No the real problem is what does and twenty-first century high school drop out have in the way of career options."

"Short answer is anything you want," Clare said. "Long answer is it will take awhile to find something that makes you happy and it might take extra education or maybe even a move off planet but you'll get there."

"Really?"

"Maybe you could…." Max began.

"I'll model for you whenever you want Max but I enjoy art as a hobby not a calling."

"Then what did you want to do before you dropped out of school?" Max asked.

"That's just it Max I was so screwed up before you came back it didn't go beyond getting out of Arcadia Bay possibly with Rachel."

"I have a suggestion," Lucksly interjected. "You could under go our training course."

Both Clare and Dulmer were shocked.

"What does it entail?" Chloe asked slightly intrigued.

"Once we get you a pass on high school equivalence about six months to a year of training," he explained. "Everything from phaser handling, and shuttle piloting to time travel science and ethics. If you complete all of it you'll be qualified to be a field agent if you want. Complete parts of the course and you go onto a modified track to fulfil one of the many support positions the department needs to keep running. Decide not to do it and we'd still like to call on both you and Max from time to time as historians, consultants and authenticators of artefacts."

"Ummm..." Chloe mulled it over in her head. "If I start I am allowed to quit any time I want right."

"Of course."

"Then let me have sometime to discuss it with this awesome woman I just started a relationship with," Chloe said. "And I'll get back to you."

"Well I looked forward to hearing your decision," Dulmer said. "But while your here I'd like to discuss the Iiipod that was in your belongs."

"I pod," Max corrected.

"Yes well its got historians excited," Dulmer explained. "We thought some of those songs were lost forever and…."


	17. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

Now until whenever: The Bright Future

Max smiled as she snapped yet another picture of Chloe. Max had doubted Chloe's plan to keep wearing her beanie but it looked great and she hadn't got it wet yet. The same couldn't be said for Max's camera, thankfully it was a water proof replica that she and Chloe had designed and replicated on the way out here to Risa. Because as soon as they heard hover surf board they knew Chloe would be riding one while Max took pictures was so happening. The anti-gravity back pack with thrusters that was currently holding Max aloft as Chloe shredded the calm weather controlled waters below was the icing one the cake.

"Max I have a stupid but potentially cool idea," Chloe called. "This thing is more like a skate board than a surf board. Fly over there and land and I'll try and see if I can still rail grind."

Max did as Chloe suggested and landed on the stone walk way that connected the southern side of the island and the main hotel to the eastern side and its promenade to the small island where Max and Chloe's beach side cabin was located. Chloe was right, the short board she had decided to hire was more skateboard like, in fact it bore more than a passing resemblance to a prop from a famous time travel movie they had watched as children centuries ago. Chloe had seen it and immediately called the DTI back on earth. Strangely Clare had answered said they already knew about it and that the big guys refused to talk about it and told them to enjoy the rest of Chloe's week off from training. Three months since Chloe had started and five months since their first official date, Chloe had loved the picnic of three whales diner food at the lighthouse and had decided that the breakfast long ago back when it was just the two whales, that never actually happened was their first unofficial date. After that each date was further from Arcadia bay. Seattle for their second of course, finally got that picture of both of them on top of the space needle. Then further across both the American continents. Various places across the earth they could never have got to back in the day. Eventually they had even gone to the moon, swimming in Lake Armstrong when they weren't suppose to was unsatisfying thankfully she had arranged an alternative. She thought for sure when her accomplices had beamed them back to Arcadia Bay for some late night splish splash in the Grant Academy's old gym swimming pool she had thought for sure it was time. But Chloe had dunked her when she had leaned in for the kiss. It didn't matter as it was Chloe who had suggested this trip and it was only day 2 of their stay. It was going to happen this week she could feel it. She held her camera up as Chloe made her approach. She clicked as Chloe jumped, she clicked as she boards landed, she clicked as Chloe slid towards her. She let out a shocked scream as Chloe grabbed her and picked her up as she slid past.

But when Chloe leant in Max accepted the Kiss as they rail grinded a piece of alien architecture, using a hover board, on a planet that was basically one big tropical resort, in a solar system several light years away from home.

"Fifty," Chloe said as she manoeuvred the board back to the water.

"Thanks for making me wait," Max said sincerely.

"Go ahead I know you want to take one," Chloe said with a smile. Max lifted the camera and took the shot, she felt Chloe kissing her cheek as she did so. The photo developed and both women looked at it. Max looked insanely happy as Chloe planted a kiss on her cheek with the Risan moons rising in the back ground.

"That's going on the wall in the rust bucket," Chloe said.

"Oh definitely," Max replied. "But her name is the Arcadian Rust and don't you forget it."

"Don't forget it was some of my music collection that got you the energy credits you used to get her."

"Chloe?" Max asked as Chloe decided to take the long way back to the cabin so she could hold onto Max for awhile longer. "What now?"

"Long term," Chloe said. "I'm going to finish my training but after that I think I've convinced the big guys of a plan I have."

"You have an actual plan?"

"Yeah, you see instead of stationing me somewhere I basically travel the galaxy with my Girlfriend ready to respond to any temporal incidents that occur where ever I might be."

"Your girlfriend likes this idea," Max says. "As long as she sets the routes most of the time."

"You'll also get the Arcadian Rust's defensive systems back up to the standards she had back when she was a Starfleet runabout."

"Chlo Chlo they already are," Max said. "I've been helping with running non transportable items around the Sol system the past two months, food stuff and medicine for the Hobus crisis. That was a requirement when I volunteered to do it even though I wasn't even taking them past Neptune's orbit."

"I thought you were concentrating on photography at the moment."

"Can't do it all the time," Max explained. "And you being all responsible inspired me bae. Besides I've got some portrait pictures of the broad range of sentient beings that when disaster struck stepped forward and I said I can help."

"I knew there was an art angle in there somewhere," Chloe chuckled. "Short term we are going back to our room and falling asleep in each others arms, if we just talk into the night or something more happens."

Max smiled at the possibility and then frowned.

"I'd like to makes sure that something more doesn't extended to us going out and seeking Jamaharon."

"I'd like to stay true to our cultural heritage for awhile and be selfish," Chloe said. "You are all mine Max Caulfield."

"As long as you realise you are all mine Chloe Price."

Thus Chloe and Max began a new part of their lives and finally rectified a mistake they had made a few times in the past. As this time they had the good sense to start it together.


End file.
